The Usual
by WolfieJimi
Summary: This is where Aziraphale and Crowley find themselves. The after. The liminal, lost, nowhereland after. The "cleaning up after the party" after. The after that no one ever talks about. The one that hands you back your life and nothing else and says "my work here is done,' as if you could even begin to pick up where you left off. As if you could get straight back to The Usual...
1. Prologue

oOo  
Prologue

...And They All Lived Happily Ever After

Twenty-four hours, from sunset to sunset. That was all that it took, in the end. Twenty-four hours to change everything. Twenty-four hours to get back to the usual. Twenty-four hours that started six-thousand years ago on the Walls of a Garden, and which still have yet to end in a hitherto undetermined location, possibly on the South Downs, if popular gossip is to be believed.

Granted, this might be _slightly _stretching the definition of " _twenty-four hours _". Unfortunately, the universe has a stubborn tendency towards complication and chaos, and neither of those things fit very neatly into sensible boxes like _"Twenty-Four Hours _" or " _Once Upon A Time..." _or " _...And they all lived Happily Ever After _". Stories can be abridged, and motion pictures can be edited. Real life is rarely so obliging. It rarely has clear beginnings and neat endings.

But for our purposes, our story began with a boy, and his father, and his friends. It began with the end of the End of the World, and with an Angel and a Demon, lost and afraid and alone but for each other. It began with the realisation that the price of surviving is figuring out how to deal with having survived.

It began without a beginning, and it began with a sunset.


	2. Into The Sunset

oOo

Into The Sunset

"You are not my dad!" Adam shouted. "And you never were."

Reality bent around itself as the young Antichrist twisted and reshaped the fabric of the universe with his words and with his will. With an angel on one shoulder and a demon on the other in perfect balance, reality shifted.

Satan bellowed.

And then he was gone.

Adam's human father had driven up the airstrip and pulled up in front of them. Burgundy car, pink sunset, gentle breeze dancing in the cool summer's air, the earth still spinning.

"Would anyone here care to explain to me what exactly is going on?!"

No one could.

Adam's father's patience wore thin, and he ordered the kids to get into the car. When they, setting their priorities straight, protested that they couldn't possibly leave their bikes, Mr Young reluctantly gave them permission to cycle back to the village - provided they went straight to their homes and stayed there.

Adam picked up his bike and cast an eye over the rag-tag group assembled on the airstrip. His expression was far too full of wisdom for an eleven year old boy. Or, perhaps, full of more wisdom than any adult could ever hope to understand. Brian squeezed Adam's arm, and Wensleydale smiled, and Pepper said "Come on," and they left, Adam's dad following behind in the car.

The earth turned.

Madame Tracy said "Well, wasn't that odd?"

And Sergeant Shadwell replied, "Aye."

Then Madame Tracy said, "I think what we need is a nice cup of tea, Mister Shadwell."

And Shadwell agreed.

Humans could be very resilient. Incredible ability to fall back to the usual. All that imagination to maintain the mundane and ignore the extraordinary. It was quite remarkable.

She asked Anathema where they might hope to get one. A cup of tea, that is. Anathema directed her to Upper Tadfield, which was a bit more metropolitan than Lower Tadfield in that it had a cafe which sold cappuccinos and stayed open until half past eight.

"Thank you, dear," Madame Tracy had said.

"No problem," Anathema had replied.

The earth kept spinning.

Crowley and Aziraphale were still standing side by side on the tarmac. Aziraphale held War's sword, his sword, loosely in his fist. Crowley was still clutching the tyre iron from his Bentley, and was turning it over in his hands. The light from the setting sun glinted red on the burnished, tarnished metal.

"We should probably be going, too," Aziraphale said, absently. "Probably not a good idea to be around when all of these nice soldiers with guns begin to wake up."

Crowley continued to stare at the last remaining remnant of his Bentley, cradled lovingly in his hands, before looking back up to the Angel beside him.

"I don't have a car."

"Ah," Aziraphale replied.

The rest of the group slowly dissipated, in a meandering, directionless kind of way. Eventually they found themselves walking back to the front gate of the base where the scooter was parked, around the corner from Newt's car, close enough to the Bentley to smell the smouldering leather.

Madame Tracy and Sergeant Shadwell said their farewells, promising to stay in contact and halfway meaning it, before clambering onto the rickety scooter and driving off, together, into the sunset.

Newt and Anathema stood arm in arm.

"Hey, book thieves!" Anathema called across to the remaining pair. "Can we give you a ride back to the village?"

Crowley had wandered off in the direction of his deceased car. He was swaying ever so slightly, and was wearing a glassy expression which Aziraphale could read even behind the dark glasses.

"Thank you, my dear, but we wouldn't want to inconvenience you."

"Oh, it's no trouble, honestly. Dick Turpin can fit four people," Newt chirped. "Bit of a squeeze, but it's not far. Although he is missing a door."

Aziraphale glanced over to Crowley. "It is very thoughtful of you both, but I… I think we could do with the walk."

"Are you sure?"

"Quite sure. Thank you, though." He mustered up a smile. Angels could be resilient, too.

Anathema took Newt by the arm. "Come on. Let's go." She locked eyes with Aziraphale, and smiled back in an empathetic, understanding sort of way. Aziraphale blinked, and swallowed, and dropped his gaze to his shoes. The witch and the junior Witchfinder walked into the sunset, together.

And the earth continued to turn.

Aziraphale waited.

"Crowley?"

"Hm."

The Bentley's flames had subsided, leaving a smoking husk, black and stark against the pastel sky.

Aziraphale had stopped to collect the remnants of the other defeated Horsemen. He fiddled with the chain on Famine's Scales.

"I suppose we should be getting on, too?"

"Yeah." A muscle in Crowley's cheek twitched as he clenched his jaw. He jammed his hands into the front pockets of his jeans and tore his gaze from the wreck of his car. "Yeah. Come on, angel."

They walked out of the airbase just in time for some very confused and seriously sheepish soldiers to begin waking up.


	3. Only The Birds

oOo

Only The Birds

The evening sun hung low in the sky, throwing golden light across the leaves on the trees. The summer breeze made the shadows of the branches dance on the path along which an Angel and a Demon walked, side by side. Birds called and sang and swooped and dipped against a backdrop of clouds painted in lilac and orange and pink and red.

As if nothing had happened. As if this was all the usual.

Crowley glanced over at Aziraphale, who was lost in thought. The Angel was still awkwardly carrying the Scales and the Crown and the Sword, every so often jiggling them into a marginally less uncomfortable position in his arms.

Crowley frowned and miracled a cardboard box out of the ether. He bumped Aziraphale with his shoulder. The Angel drifted out of his reverie and blinked at Crowley, who was holding the box out to him as nonchalantly as he could manage.

Aziraphale looked blankly between the box and the Demon with an expression affable, but confused. Crowley rolled his eyes. Jerking his head towards the stack of unwieldy occult objects stacked in Aziraphale's hands, he snapped, eloquently,

"Things. Box. Put."

Aziraphale glanced down at his hands, and it clicked.

"Oh!" He bleated, and he looked back up at Crowley, who looked away.

It clicked again. A little act of kindness. A little show of compassion. A little demonic miracle of his own, played so cool, so self-conscious. So Crowley.

"Oh…"

The Angel smiled, then. A real, heartfelt smile this time, so far removed from the smile he gave Anathema on the airbase it barely deserved the same name.

"Thank you, Crowley. That is very thoughtful of you." He began depositing the items into the box. "As usual." He beamed at the Demon.

Crowley pulled a face and said "ngngnyeurgh" as he shoved the box into Aziraphale's hands, and shoved his own hands back into his pockets. Aziraphale, suppressing an indulgent smile, dropped his gaze to the floor. If he walked a little closer to Crowley for the remainder of their journey, only the birds knew.

Defying all expectation, the world continued turning...


	4. After

oOo

after

By the time they reached the village, it was gone eight-thirty; an advanced hour for a respectable village such as Lower Tadfield. Crowley and Aziraphale were at a standstill.

They had no car. No idea how they were going to get back to London. And, in all honesty, no clue whatsoever as to what they were supposed to do next. Neither Aziraphale nor Crowley had entirely expected there to be a next. Of course they had believed there would be. They had hoped that the world wasn't going to be annihilated by the legions of Heaven and Hell, and they had expended a not inconsiderable amount of energy doing what little they could to actively prevent that from happening. But they'd been so wrapped up in saving the world and each other that they hadn't really considered what they would do when, and if, they succeeded.

Here is where Crowley and Aziraphale now found themselves: The centre of a crossroads in the middle of a sleepy Oxfordshire village, hip-deep in the after.

No one ever really thinks about the "after", especially not when any "after" is far from guaranteed. Of course, you think about the After. The After in "Happily Ever After", and "After the dust settles", and "After all is said and done". The hopeful After that promises all of this will be worth it, the light in the dark keeping you from giving up. But before the After, you have, simply, the after.

The liminal, lost, nowhereland after. The "cleaning up after the party" after. The after that no one ever talks about. The one that hands you back your life and nothing else and says "my work here is done,'' as if you could even begin to pick up where you left off. As if you could get straight back to the usual humdrum of the now mythical Before, as if nothing had changed at all. This after leaves you stranded and penniless and strung out in the street, unsure of how you got from A to B, let alone how you are supposed to get to Z, where the real After must be waiting for you, surely?

It was all a bit too much to process.

Crowley turned to look at Aziraphale. The Angel stared back at him, meeting the Demon's faltering gaze with an anxious and exhausted one of his own. Crowley took a deep breath and chose his words carefully.

"Right... Pub?"

Aziraphale nodded.

"Oh, I should think so."


	5. One Good Blink

oOo

One Good Blink

Locating a pub didn't prove difficult. As is often the case with these tiny rural villages, too small for a _Tesco Express _or a _Sainsbury's Local _, whose inhabitants have to make do with a single _Spar _charging 15p above the usual rate for a pint of milk, Tadfield had no less than four Public Houses. They entered the first one they came across, _The Shepherds Crown._

Aziraphale held the door for Crowley, who sauntered in ahead of him. Aziraphale headed directly to the bar, pausing only to hand the sword and the box over to Crowley, who drifted off to secure them a table.

This wasn't strictly necessary, as the place was nearly empty. A handful of people, clearly The Regulars, loitered at the bar; a couple of teenagers Crowley doubted were of legal age played pool in a back corner; a smattering of lonely drinkers and drinking lovers punctuated every fifth table at appropriately English intervals. The risk of _not _securing a decent table was about as high as Aziraphale actually selling one of his books.

This line of thinking caused a wave of panic to wash over Crowley, as he remembered that Aziraphale selling any of his books to anyone, ever, was now completely out of the question. He ordered himself not to think about it.

_Find a table, find a table _…

Finding the best table whilst Aziraphale got the drinks had become a Habit of theirs, and Crowley found it was easier to run on autopilot than to think.

_Just do, don't think. Find a table, find a -_

He winced as he noticed the fire burning in the grate at the far end of the room. It caught him off guard and the panic came back with a vengeance.

_Stay calm. Stay calm._

"Bloody ridiculous, lighting a fire at this time of year," he muttered to himself, industriously ignoring the burning grip the taunting flames were holding on his throat.

_Bookshop, Bentley, buh-bye angel… _

_Stay. Calm._

He slid into a comfortable booth-table as far from the fireplace as he could. He redirected his nervous energy by enthusiastically cursing whichever idiot thought it was a good idea to light a fire during the summer. Probably an _atmosphere _thing, he decided. They probably thought it made the place feel _home-y _. People were idiots.

_Stay calm. Stay calm. Find something else to focus on..._

From his newly secured location, Crowley was able to see Aziraphale standing at the bar, patiently waiting for the bartender's attention. He watched him. He made him his point of focus, blurring all of everything else in his mind, pushing it all to the periphery. Crowley watched the Angel. The exhaustion behind the desultory smile, the tension carried in the lines around his eyes, the set of his shoulders falling more heavily than usual, less upright, less rigid. He watched as the smile flitted on and off of his face, appearing the moment someone looked at him, swiftly fading again when unobserved.

He had spoken with the bartender now, and was waiting for the drinks. He hadn't asked Crowley what he wanted. He hadn't needed too. He never needed to. When had that happened?

And how long had they been doing _this _, Crowley wondered to himself. Coming to pubs and bars and dives and speakeasies, diners and cafes and fascinating little restaurants where they knew you? Crowley couldn't even remember the first time. In the beginning they had always just sort of ended up together; chance meetings and random encounters always extended just beyond the boundaries of " _enemies yes, naturally, but no need for bad manners _". They'd talk, and drink, and complain, and offload, and then go their separate ways feeling all the better for it, aside from the vague worry that they were doing something not strictly copacetic. But they'd never planned it or intended it or admitted that they enjoyed it.

Then Rome happened. The first time either of them had explicitly extended an invitation - and it had been _Aziraphale _asking _him _, _tempting _him. Crowley always felt he'd let the team down a bit on that one. That was the beginning of the end, really. It was a slow descent, but a relentless one. Perhaps an inevitable one.

And now, here Crowley found himself, with Habits. With Expectations. With something to lose.

Because the problem was that _every _place was fascinating little place where someone knew him, when he was with Aziraphale. Anywhere could be entertaining, anything interesting, any time well spent when spent with him. And wherever he was without Aziraphale, Crowley had come to realise in a moment of existential panic, was somewhere dull, tedious, and lonely. He could be at the Taj Mahal, the Louvre, his favourite little coffeeshop just off Mayfair, it made no difference. If he couldn't turn to Aziraphale and make some wickedly sly comment about the woman complaining that her ice water was too cold, and be rewarded by that glint of laughter in his eyes even as he tutted, then what was the point of being there at all? Of being _anywhere _? Indeed, what was the point of _anything _?

And the Angel knew him. _Really _knew him, in that comfortable, enveloping, terrifying way which creeps up on you so slowly that you don't notice until it's too late. Until one day they know which drink to order for you, which jokes will make you laugh when you're trying to play it cool, which words to say to twist you around their little finger.

And you, you know _them _too. You know what pastry to collect from their favourite bakery when you need to cheer them up, what arguments to make when they are doubting themselves, what unspoken words lay beneath every eye-flash and eyebrow-twitch and barely-there pursing-of-the-lips. When to leave and when to stay. When to speak out and when to shut up. When to dart out your hand to catch the mug of tepid and forgotten cocoa they are about to knock over in their oblivious enthusiasm for storytelling. You never meant for it to happen, you never even noticed that it _was _happening, but by then it's too late. It has already become the usual, and you never even realised it until it was being snatched away.

Crowley grimaced. Dwelling on things like this did no one any good, least of all him. And whilst being in favour of things that Do No Good in general, when it came to himself particularly - and more pertinently, to Aziraphale - Crowley was all for Good. The more Good the better. Good all round.

He had never been a fan of _The Beach Boys _, but over the past week Crowley had developed a new-found appreciation for "God Only Knows" _._

Aziraphale brought their drinks to the table.

Crowley grunted an unintelligible acknowledgment as Aziraphale slid into the seat opposite, pushing the box of occult accoutrements further along the padded bench, clumsily skirting around the sword propped up against the leg of the table.

"A fire in August?" Aziraphale complained, nodding his head toward the fireplace across the room. "Bit warm for that, isn't it?"

"We can move, if it's too close. Or go somewhere else, if -"

"No, no, it's fine," Aziraphale cut in. "It's not a problem. It just seems rather -"

"Idiotic."

" - unnecessary."

"Someone probably thinks it _'creates an atmosphere.' _" Crowley drawled the words sarcastically, and felt gratified by the amused look he received as reward. Something good from something bad. Not terribly Demonic, but Crowley supposed none of that really mattered anymore.

Aziraphale placed two glasses of scotch, neat up, "_ as God… Satan… the _human who invented it _had intended _", Crowley always said, on the table in front of him. The Angel had ordered the same for himself, only on the rocks with a twist. _'Blasphemy' _Crowley muttered, as he always did, earning himself another chastising, charmed glare from Aziraphale for his efforts, as he always did. A dusty bottle of red wine sat in the middle of the table between them.

Quiet descended. Crowley didn't like it. He could hear his thoughts too much when it was quiet.

"They don't serve food here?" He asked, glancing around at the other patrons to see if anyone was eating. "Seems unlikely for a country pub on a Saturday."

"Kitchen closes at seven," Aziraphale replied. "I asked."

"You want something? I could get them to -"

Aziraphale brushed off the suggestion. "It's fine. I didn't particularly like the look of the menu anyway. It's always hit and miss with places like this."

"We can go get something somewhere else, if you like. I saw a chippie a few streets back. We could finish up these and -"

"No, no, honestly Crowley. It's fine. I'm fine. I'm not hungry," Aziraphale interrupted once again.

Crowley began wondering whether he'd ever be able to finish a sentence at any point in the near future. Then he began to think about the fact that they _had _a near future now, when they so nearly didn't, and his thoughts started threatening to spiral off again. He changed the subject.

"Nice place, though. Sort of."

"Mm."

"Well, I mean, if you're into that kind of... rural, 1950s, farmer-ish aesthetic. Which I suppose some people must be. It has gone all-in on that, hasn't it? Can't say it doesn't commit to the theme..." Crowley inspected the pub and its patrons with a discriminating eye. "Even the customers seem to be buying in to the, you know, mmm, vibe. Bit unnerving, actually. Surprising dearth of tartan, though, which I'm sure you feel the lack of keenly, angel -"

To his surprise, when he looked back to Aziraphale, the Angel's eyes were glistening. And not in the nice, endeared, affectionate way that Crowley would never admit to liking. No, these eyes looked like they were one good blink away from tears. Aziraphale was trying to hide this, of course, but he had no poker face whatsoever, especially not with Crowley. Crowley could always read him like a book. Sometimes he wished he couldn't.

"Aziraphale?" He said, backing away from the word even as he said it.

Aziraphale sniffed and looked up, not quite at Crowley, but in his general direction. He looked as though he was attempting a smile, but couldn't quite manage it. He swallowed and blinked in a rapid, fluttery, tear-dispersing sort of a way.

"What?"

Crowley dithered. On the one hand, he wanted to ask if Aziraphale was alright. Ask if he wanted to talk about it. If there was anything he could do.

On the other hand, he really didn't.

"Nothing," Crowley said, hating himself a little bit.

It had been a very long week.

They drank in silence for a handful of minutes. Crowley downed his first glass of scotch in one burning throatful and was debating doing the same to the second. Aziraphale was watching the ice melt in his now empty glass.

"Do you remember that dinner we had at Petronius' place, in Rome?"

Crowley raised his eyebrows.

"Yeah. Yeah, I do." He quirked his head. "Why?"

"No reason, really. It was nice though, wasn't it?"

"Yeah. Yeah. Good food. Place was a bit weird, but really good food."

"I liked it."

"I know."

"All of that hoo-hah with Gaius and Cassius after did rather put a damper on things."

Crowley pulled a face. "Eh… Yeah… that… wasn't ideal." He shrugged. "S'Rome for you."

"But before that it was nice."

"Yeah."

Aziraphale swirled the lemon slice around in his glass, making the ice clink.

"I was a nervous wreck for months after that, you know."

"Oh?"

"Kept thinking '_ Someone is bound to find out. Michael is going to be furious. Gabriel will be apoplectic. _' Inviting a Demon out to dinner? I was convinced I'd be stripped of my post. Or worse. Kept asking myself what the hell I had been thinking. And then I started feeling positively nauseous with guilt over what Hell would do to _you _if they found out."

Crowley said nothing.

"And naturally that made me worry even more. Why was I so concerned over what Hell did with one of their own agents? I ought to have been hoping that you_ would _get into trouble, not worrying that _I _had gotten you into it. It was all rather a mess, actually."

He lifted his drink to his lips but paused before drinking. Cradling the glass with both hands, he stared down into it speculatively.

"In the end I decided that if the worst came to the worst, I could claim I was doing reconnaissance. Trying to gather intelligence on the Enemy's plans. And I figured that you could do the same, if you got into any hot water with your Side. Not terribly convincing, but plausible enough, I thought. I even figured out a way I could warn you without either side knowing, if need be. Rationalised that it wouldn't _really _have been helping The Other Side. It wouldn't be terribly Angelic to let someone else suffer for one's own mistakes, would it, Demon or otherwise... And so it wouldn't really have been _wrong _to help you, in that situation..."

Aziraphale smiled a wan, self-deprecating smile that made Crowley's chest ache. "That's what I told myself, anyway."

"You never said anything."

"I never needed to, in the end. Never came up. All seems rather silly now, doesn't it?"

Crowley hesitated, chewing over his words, trying to decide whether to swallow them or spit them out.

"Do you regret it? Uh, any of it?"

"No." Aziraphale replied unflinchingly, almost before the words were out of Crowley's mouth. "Not in the slightest."

He held Crowley's gaze for a second, before looking back down at his drink.

"Oh." Crowley opened his mouth, and closed it, and opened it again. "Yeah. Good. Me too. Or, me neither, I mean. Regret it. Any of it. Uh..."

They finished their second set of drinks in silence.


	6. A Car From 1926

oOo

A Car From 1926

After a while Crowley stretched, rolling his shoulders and cracking his neck. He glanced at his unforgivably expensive watch and sighed.

"We should probably be getting along," he said. "Find out if there's any way to get back to London from here. I don't know about you, angel, but the site of the Almost-Apocalypse isn't at the top of my list of '_ places I want to sleep tonight _'."

"Rather not," Aziraphale agreed. "I'll go and ask the landlord about transportation arrangements, shall I?"

"Nah, s'alright," said Crowley, pulling his phone from his jacket pocket. "Got an app." He drew a complicated sigil on the lock screen.

"Ah. An 'app'." In the Angel's mouth the word _'app' _sounded more accusatory than Beelzebub's ' _traitor' _. "Why those things are so popular is beyond me."

"They're useful. Convenient," Crowley replied, not looking up from his phone.

"I don't understand why one would use one's telephone to make an enquiry when people with no doubt greater and more personally tailored local knowledge are a mere handful of feet away."

"Well _you _go ask the 'people' then," Crowley snapped. " _I'm _using this."

"No, no," Aziraphale said with an air of imperial magnanimity. "We'll use the 'app'."

Crowley didn't respond. He continued tapping at the screen. Aziraphale grew impatient.

"I don't understand how that thing can give you an accurate answer. How does it know where we are, for one? Do you have the postcode of this establishment?"

"It uses satellites or something, I don't know, but _it knows _," Crowley hissed, adding under his breath, "knows a lot better than these hicks, anyway.."

"Crowley! Honestly, must you be so…" Aziraphale trailed off with a frown and a despairing shake of his head. "All I am saying is that when local knowledge is required, one is always better off asking real local people."

Crowley finally looked up from the phone in order to glare at the Angel, glarefully.

"Why are you so technophobic? What's technology ever done to you, hm? I have honestly got no idea how you get by in this day and age with such a _parochial _attitude. Bet you got on great with the Luddites didn't you?"

"They had reasonable concerns, Crowley, but that is beside the point. I'm not a technophobe. I use a computer."

"Yeah, from 1987."

"You drive a car from 1926, you are _hardly _one to -" Aziraphale caught himself, too late.

Crowley grimaced and turned his attention back to his phone.

"Oh. Oh, my dear boy, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to -"

"Forget it."

"But I shouldn't have -"

"Forget it, angel!" Crowley snapped, but not unkindly. "Doesn't matter."

Aziraphale closed his mouth.

"Right!" Crowley brightened and lifted his phone up triumphantly. "I think we're there!"

"You've found something?"

"There's a bus. Stop's just a few roads across from here. It'll get us to London."

"A bus direct to London? From here?" Aziraphale tried unsuccessfully to keep the scepticism out of his tone. "At this hour?"

Crowley groaned.

"Yes, there is a bus. Yes, it will get us to London. Happy with that? Or would you rather walk? Or shall I summon a flock of gigantic eagles to swoop down and carry you on their backs?"

Aziraphale raised his hands in a placatory manner.

"No, no. The bus sounds perfect. Just the ticket." His eyes softened and he smiled, purse-lipped. "Thank you, Crowley."

Crowley rolled his eyes, biting the insides of his cheeks to keep himself from grinning back. No need to give the bastard Angel the response he was fishing for.

"Shut up," he said, placing both hands on the table and pushing himself up, "Come on." He grabbed the bottle of wine off of the table and shoved it, classily, into his jacket pocket.

Aziraphale slid out of the seat, pausing only to pick up the box.

"Oi." Crowley nodded toward the Sword, still leaning against the leg of the table.

Aziraphale blushed. "Ah. Yes. Seems I'm not terribly adept at hanging on to the old girl, am I?"

"Come on, angel. Let's get the hell out of here."

They made their way out of the pub, and onto the streets of Lower Tadfield.


	7. Only

oOo

Only

Outside of the claustrophobic pub, Aziraphale sighed, taking a deep breath and filling his lungs with the clean countryside air. It was sweeter than the air in London, he thought. He hadn't ever really considered the taste of the air, before. He'd always taken it for granted. It was easier to take things for granted when you hadn't nearly lost them forever.

London air was dense and heavy, saturated with the fumes of a million cars and buses and taxis and people. It was as though it were weighed down with the drive and desperation and desires of countless souls trying to make their way in a city that habitually chewed people up and spat them out like chewing gum mosaics on the pavement. Countless souls in need of _help _.

The air here couldn't have been more different. It was crisp and clear, full of wide open fields, and drystone walls, and the heady weight of countless unchanged generations. London was old, yes, but it moved with the times. It wrestled with them and changed with them, discarding some things and doggedly holding on to others, dragging along through the centuries, never stopping. Never turning away from the glare of the next morning.

Here, time seemed an irrelevance. An inconvenience. This place was older than its years. Staid and traditional, it stayed with tradition, turning away in disdain from gauche and metropolitan modernity. A hundred years and only the addition of motor cars and electricity had changed Lower Tadfield's handsome and weather worn face.

Where London was a riot, a pocket of the universe filled to the brim with diversions and diversity and distractions, a brilliant, mercurial mess of life and litter and places to lunch, here the universe felt as though it was on pause. A permanent freeze-frame of a perfect moment

Aziraphale closed his eyes. He wanted to get back to his own world. To his shop. To his books. To St James' Park and the British Museum and the Ritz. To his corner of calm amidst the glorious chaos. Back to the niche he had carved for himself, back to his routines and the security of familiarity. Back to the usual.

But he also knew that, as things stood, with things as they were, he wanted to stay _here_. In this bubble. In this liminal space, cut out from the world and placed on a high shelf, out of reach from grasping hands. Where the world had stopped, and hadn't stopped, and was always stopped, and would never be stopped. He wanted to stay in this place that didn't belong to him, this place that was filled with someone else's love, and which was someone else's responsibility. This place that was _protected_.

Because Aziraphale knew, deep down, that there was no going back to the usual. Not now. Maybe one day, maybe. Maybe eventually, if he survived. If they both survived. If they survived and could repair the damage done to them. The damage they'd done to each other. The damage that Heaven and Hell were still, no doubt, planning to do to them.

And that was why he didn't want to leave. The moment he stepped onto that bus the spell would be broken. There was some holy, or unholy, or perhaps, simply very _human _power shielding this place. It amplified the pastoral peace, and wove it inextricably into the fabric of reality. Love, pure and possessive, thrummed like electricity through the earth. _This is mine _, it echoed through the rocks and the trees and the bones of the people _. This is mine and you can't have it. _Heaven and Hell had no power here. Adam, consciously or unconsciously, had Lower Tadfield under his protection. Aziraphale knew that it always would be.

But the Angel also knew that that protection did not extend to him. He was marked. He was a target. He knew Heaven well enough to know that they wouldn't write this off, wouldn't chalk it up as a lesson learned, or sweep it under the carpet, embarrassed. No, Heaven loved their scapegoats. Their martyrs. Their petty vengeances.

And Crowley. Oh, Crowley. Crowley was roped in on all of this, too. Roped to the bullseye, roped to the stake. Roped to Aziraphale.

_They _were marked. _They _were targets. _They _were in this _together _. Mutually assured destruction.

But they had nowhere they could hide, and there was nowhere left to run. They couldn't stay here. They didn't belong here. Their presence sent ripples across the water, it disturbed the air. They had to leave, or they'd be made to leave. The Angel knew this.

Sometimes knowing something doesn't make it any easier to accept. And he was so, so _tired _.

Aziraphale shook himself out of his thoughts, and glanced over at Crowley. To his surprise, he found that the Demon was staring at him. He'd looked away as soon as the Angel's gaze had fallen upon him, of course, but not quickly enough. Not quickly enough for Aziraphale to miss the strange expression on his face.

"Crowley?"

"Yep." His reply was terse and his eyes stayed glued to the road ahead of him.

"Are you… Are you alright?" Aziraphale spoke carefully, the words shards of glass rolling around on his tongue.

Crowley said nothing. He just carried on walking and staring out into the darkness before them. Aziraphale was beginning to wonder whether he had heard him at all, when he finally replied.

When Crowley spoke, he did so very softly, and without turning his head.

"I'm not sure, to be honest."

Aziraphale felt knots in his chest tighten.

He wanted Crowley to be alright. _He _wanted to be alright. He wanted to _make it _all alright. He wanted to shut his eyes and will it all away.

But what could he do? What could either of them do? You couldn't fight reality, you couldn't deny truth. Doing that hadn't served him terribly well in the past, had it? That seeking to control reality, trying to warp it to what you wanted it to be instead of looking it squarely in the eye and accepting that the only thing you could change was yourself_ ..._

The knots unravelled and Aziraphale stopped holding his breath.

"No. Neither am I, really," he said.

Crowley did look at him, then, and he smiled. It was a sad and lopsided kind of a smile, but for a moment Aziraphale couldn't help but think that he had never seen anything more beautiful. It made him feel as though he had the strength to step back out into the chaos and deal with, well, deal with whatever came next. As though, tired as he was, things might not be all that bad. Not really. Not when that smile was still in the universe, shining on him in the darkness.

How strange, Aziraphale thought, that something so small as a smile could have such a profound impact. How ridiculous. It was only a smile. It was only Crowley.

Ay, there's the rub.

_Only Crowley. _

Aziraphale didn't have to worry, if it was only Crowley. Who has shown up, inconveniently? Oh, it's only Crowley. Who have I hurt with careless or cruel words, this time? Only Crowley. Who do I stand to lose if I bugger this all up? Only Crowley. Only Crowley.

It _was _only Crowley. It was _always _only Crowley. The only constant presence in his life, throughout all of these thousands of years, the sole source of stability? That was only Crowley. The only voice, sarcastic and bitter and playful and wise, that he ever missed in that particular, aching, longing way? That was only Crowley's. The only person Aziraphale felt he truly knew, the only person who Aziraphale felt he truly trusted? Only Crowley.

His thoughts spiralled.

Only Crowley to complain to. Only Crowley to talk with. Only Crowley who understood. Only Crowley to help, only Crowley to the rescue, only Crowley upon whom he could rely. Only Crowley to laugh with, only Crowley to debate with, only Crowley to share with, get drunk with, figure out the world with. Only Crowley, time and time again, Crowley, Crowley, only, always Crowley.

And only Crowley who could make him feel like, maybe, just maybe, he was good enough. Only Crowley who knew him for all that he was. Only Crowley who said _"Yeah. That one. I like that one. For all that he is, that one's alright _. _That one's mine. _"

It was only a smile.

It was only Crowley.

And as for love? Well, yes, that too. He was an Angel, after all. He loved all things, in that Universal, theoretical, distant kind of way. So of course Crowley fell under that umbrella, along with everything else. That wasn't only for Crowley. That was for everything. That was the point. That made it all okay.

But that other kind of love... The individualistic, up close and personal kind? The kind that makes you selfish and susceptible, possessive and over-protective? The kind that makes the world seem a little brighter, and makes you smile without realising you're smiling? That love which inspired Plato to imagine twin-souls split from each other as punishment by the gods, forever seeking reunion? The_ human _kind?

That kind of love got inside you and made you its home. It took you over from within, so slowly, so gradually, so imperceptibly that it was almost invisible, until suddenly it wasn't. Until suddenly your heart ached and you didn't know why, when all they did was smile...

No, that wasn't Angelic Love. Angels didn't go in for that. Aziraphale certainly didn't. Not really. Not for people. Not for real. Or, nearly. Nearly for nothing. Nearly never.

Only for -

"Hellooooo, angel?" Crowley said, waving his hand in front of Aziraphale's face. "Not to be indelicate, or impatient, or anything… But is there any reason we are standing in the middle of the road doing bugger all? You just sort of... stopped." He pulled a face. "We're gonna miss the bus."

Aziraphale looked down at his feet which, to his surprise, had indeed stopped walking. Rude of them, he thought, to do so without consulting him first. And for leaving him standing so very close to Crowley. Did his feet have no respect for personal space? He would have to have a word with them.

"Oh. So I have." He looked back up at Crowley. "Sorry. It's… I- I think I'm rather tired."

Crowley softened, because of course he did. He always did. Aziraphale loved that he did. He hated that he did. He sought it out and he fled from it.

"Yeah?" Crowley said.

"It has been rather a long day."

"Uh… Yyyyeah. Yeah. No, yeah. It really has."

"Quite exhausting, really."

"Mmm."

"Taxing."

"Hah."

"Makes it somewhat hard to…"

"Yeah."

"I think I'm just rather tired."

"Yeah. You said that."

"S'most likely the reason that I, uh, that I, uh…"

Aziraphale's words drifted off into the night, and neither moved to stop them. Instead, the Angel and the Demon stayed standing in the centre of the street, staring and searching, as silence surrounded them. Crowley swallowed. Aziraphale took a step.

"Crowley, I -"

_!AAAOWEEEE AAAOOOWOOOO AAAAAWEEEE AOOOWOOOO!_

A car alarm went off, and they both nearly jumped out of their skin.

Crowley yelped and nearly tripped over his feet.

Aziraphale exclaimed, "Good Lord!", and clutched a hand to his chest.

The universe, as always, has impeccable timing.

Panting, Aziraphale threw daggers in the direction of the offending vehicle, and Crowley snickered, catching his breath and scrubbing his hands across his eyes. This day had been about a hundred years too long.

"Come on, angel. Let's get out of here before someone accuses us of attempting Grand Theft Auto. On top of _everything else _."


	8. The Gap

oOo

**The Gap**

A van pulled up.

It said _International Delivery _on the side.

A driver got out and approached them both. He'd come to collect the scales and the crown and the sword, he'd said. Really, Crowley thought, they ought to be questioning this. Why was this human here, collecting up the Tools of The Apocalypse? And why were they just _handing _them to him? He was getting Aziraphale to _sign _for them. Was that normal? Was that a thing?

"Do you believe in life after death?" The driver asked.

"I suppose I must do," Aziraphale replied. He seemed so far away, and yet...

"Yeah," the driver chuckled. Crowley couldn't see what was funny. "See, if I was to tell my wife what had happened to me today, she'd never believe me..."

Aziraphale sat down, and looked over at Crowley, his gaze overflowing with things unsaid.

"... and I wouldn't blame her."

The delivery driver picked up the box, leaving a gap between the Angel and the Demon, and left.

Well, the gap had always been there, Crowley supposed, it had just been filled by the box. The box of Crowley's creation, for Aziraphale's convenience. The box filled with so much occult (or was it ethereal?) junk. None of it had truly belonged to either of them, but it had ended up being their responsibility, nonetheless. One more of many consequences for their actions. The box and its contents had existed and it had demanded a space in the universe. Demanded division. And… now it didn't. Or, at least, if it did, it did so somewhere else, and as someone else's responsibility. Someone else's burden to carry.

And yet the gap remained. They were sitting no further apart than they had been before. The imposed distance was no greater, the degree of separation no higher. That hadn't changed. It shouldn't have been remarkable in any way, and yet here Crowley was, silently remarking upon it, and wondering why he was doing so. It was nothing out of the usual.

Except that now those things that had been a wall between them were suddenly gone. All that remained was the gap, ravenous and resonant and no longer really required. Wrong, somehow. Crowley felt it, keenly.

All of this flashed through Crowley's mind in the quarter of a second it took the driver to leave. In the quarter of a second it took for Aziraphale to turn to Crowley, and smile.

It was a good smile, Crowley thought. It warmed the lines around the Angel's eyes and glittered in small flickers at the corners of his mouth. Not an Angelically good smile, but an Aziraphale-ish-ly good smile, which was infinitely better in every way. Crowley found himself gazing back at him across the gap. That smile felt like a bridge, a rope across the void, pulling him in. Offering him solace, offering him hope. He seemed so far away, and yet somehow closer than he'd ever been. Close enough to reach out and -

Crowley checked himself. It was only a smile.

Headlights pierced the darkness and Aziraphale's attention shifted from the Demon to the long-awaited bus as it turned a corner further up the road.

"Oh! There it is." Aziraphale's pleasant smile turned to a confused frown. "... It says Oxford on the front."

Crowley turned from Aziraphale and glanced at the bus. It did indeed say "Oxford" on the front.

"Yeah… But it'll drive to London anyway," he said, taking a swig of wine. "Just won't know why."

Aziraphale disapproved, in a resigned and weary and _well-I-shouldn't-be-surprised _sort of way. Crowley didn't have to look at him to know that. The discontentment radiated from him.

But Crowley hadn't _lied. _He had told the Angel that there was a bus, and there was a bus. He'd told him that that bus would get them to London, and, well, it would. He'd never said that there was a bus _scheduled _to go to London. It wasn't _his _fault if Aziraphale had jumped to conclusions. Crowley didn't feel he should be blamed for Angels and their assumptions, and if anyone had any problem with that they could take their holier-than-thou judgemental-ish-ness and shove it up their -

"I suppose I should get him to drop me off at the bookshop," Aziraphale said.


	9. No Small Mercy

oOo

**No Small Mercy**

Crowley felt the earth fall away from under him. His heart lurched as it dropped, clattering, to the pit of his stomach.

_I suppose I should get him to drop me off at the bookshop._

_No, _Crowley thought, all irritation immediately and completely eviscerated. _Oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Oh, angel._

Aziraphale had forgotten.

Forgotten, or deliberately blocked the memory from his mind. Crowley could empathise. There were quite a number of things he presently wished he could exorcise from his own memory. Things that were burned into him deep below the surface, seared through his subcutaneous conscious and branded deep into his bones. Things that would take a long time to mend. Things that would scar.

It would be no small mercy to let Aziraphale's psychological bandages stay on for just a little while longer, would it not? To let the Angel carry on in happy ignorance just a _little while longer _instead of adding this particular burning burden to the load? To let him hold on to that tiny surviving glimmer of innocence and hope _just a while longer _, just until… Until…

Until what? Until when? Until they got back to Soho and he was suddenly faced with the spectre of his gutted home? Until he'd sat for two hours on a bus, thinking about walking back into his beautiful, beautiful bookshop, looking forward to throwing himself down onto his obscenely comfortable sofa and closing his eyes, finally? Until Crowley turned and said "_ Oh, by the way, about the bookshop, not sure if it slipped your mind, but it and everything you love were totally destroyed in a huge fucking fire. Well, I'll leave you to deal with that then. See you round."_

No small mercy, indeed.

_Oh, Aziraphale. I'm sorry. I watched it burn. There was nothing I could do. I was too late. I'm sorry. I am so, so sorry._


	10. An Invitation, Implied

oOo

**An Invitation, Implied**

"I suppose I should get him to drop me off at the bookshop?" Aziraphale said.

It was a ridiculous thing to say, Aziraphale thought even as he spoke. And he'd said it with a question mark, even though there was no obvious query in the words, which was even more ridiculous. He was asking something, asking something of Crowley… But asking _what _? Yes, it really was a _ridiculous _thing to say. Whatever question was hidden in the words, Aziraphale knew he probably shouldn't be asking it.

Because where else would he get the bus to drop him off? Where else could he possibly go? They wouldn't reach London until gone midnight, and they were both far too tired to go anywhere but home. Where on earth _else _would Aziraphale go? It was obvious where he would go, where both of them would go.

Crowley would go to his flat in Mayfair, and Aziraphale would go back to the bookshop. Separately. Individually. Independently.

Naturally.

Obviously.

Where else? What else? What was he thinking? What was he even _asking _?

Aziraphale, of course, knew _precisely _what he was asking. But even to himself, even now, he was reluctant to admit it.

The thing was, he didn't feel particularly safe. He did _not _want to leave the protection of Tadfield, that much he had accepted, but he had resigned himself to the fact that he must. He was going to get on this bus, and leave this safe place, and head back into the real world, for all that _that _was worth. He was doing that much.

But to also leave the protection of _Crowley _? The Angel didn't think he could bear it. He was tired, and afraid, and horribly, woefully alone.

And that's what he was asking, wasn't it? He was asking not to be left alone. He was asking for Crowley to come up with a reason to get off at the bookshop, too. To find some excuse, some justification, some pretence under which he could invite himself in.

Because then Aziraphale would _have _to offer him something to drink, be rude not to, after all. And then Crowley would throw himself on the sofa and Aziraphale would tut at him for putting his shoes on the cushions but would never actually ask him to move, and Crowley would grow quieter and quieter until, _oh no, look, he has fallen asleep, what a nuisance, but it would be a shame to wake him if he's that tired, not ideal to have a Demon asleep on one's sofa but it can't be helped, nothing else for it._

And then Aziraphale would drape a blanket over him, and settle himself in the comfortable armchair opposite with a mug of cocoa and a book he had no intention of reading, until he too fell, peaceful at last, into a deep and dreamless sleep. Comfortable in the knowledge that his- that Crowley was safe, and that he was close. Safe in the realisation that he_wasn't alone _.

That's all he was asking for. An answer to a question, unspoken. Acceptance of an invitation, implied.

Crowley obliged.

"It burned down, r'member?"


	11. Tilt-a-Whirl

oOo

**Tilt-a-Whirl**

"It burned down, r'member?"

Aziraphale blinked.

It took a moment for Crowley's words to sink in.

He'd spoken them so carefully, so gently. It reminded Aziraphale of the way he would handle exceptionally rare and old manuscripts, with kid gloves and a steady hand, turning each page - or in Crowley's case speaking each word - with the lightest possible touch, fearing that anything heavier would cause the pages to crumble and shatter into dust.

Fearing that anything heavier would cause Aziraphale to crumble and shatter into dust.

_It burned down, remember?_

The bookshop had burned down.

Of course. Of course it had. Of course Aziraphale remembered. Crowley had told him it had, hadn't he? Back in the… the wherever it was. That's how Crowley had gotten _The Book _, Agnes' book. He'd pulled it from the flames. The flames of the burning bookshop. A souvenir, he'd said. The only thing left. Everything else was gone, lost. Aziraphale could barely think. The bookshop. His bookshop. His home since 1793, gone. Burned to cinders and ash. All those books, those priceless, irreplaceable books...

He had - he _had _had… - the originals of John of Patmos' _Revelations _. A hand-signed copy of Mother Shipton's Prophecies. An entire set of Oscar Wilde First Editions. The only copy of Terry Pratchett's unfinished, unpublished, and subsequently steamrolled stories. A first draft copy of Petronius' _Satyricon _complete with pithy notes, jokes, and comments in the margins addressed to Aziraphale personally. The real _Gospel of Judas _. All gone. All burned.

His _home _...

"You can stay at my place, if you like," Crowley said.

And for a split second the earth stopped turning.

For a split second, Aziraphale's head stopped spinning.

For just a fraction of a moment, the rest of everything ceased to be, and in one diamond moment of clarity Crowley was all that existed.

And then, of course, the tilt-a-whirl resumed.

A thousand and one emotions spun through the Angel, pinning him down with their centripetal force. There were more than he could begin to recognise, faster that he could begin process. It was overwhelming. It was too much. Flashes of fear, despair, desperation, panic, and loss. Hope, happiness, gratitude, and want. Confusion, conflict, and guilt. And love, yes, love, _so much love. _So much love that he didn't know what to do with it. So much love that it turned back into panic.

_Yes, I would like that. I would like that more than anything. I would like that more than you can ever know. I'm not sure I've ever wanted anything more. And I have nothing else left, Crowley. _

But then the usual, the reliable, the _needed _survival instincts kicked back in. They kept him in line. They kept them safe.

"I don't think my side would like that."

Because Aziraphale really did have nothing else left. Nothing but Crowley_ . _If the price of keeping him, of _keeping him safe _, was to never truly _have _him, Aziraphale would pay it every time. Just as he had been for the past six thousand years. Even if -

"You don't have a side any more. Neither of us do."

Crowley's words derailed the Angel's train of thoughts, pulling the tracks from beneath them and sending them spiralling and careening and spinning into the unknown. Into the unexplored.

Because Crowley was right. Aziraphale_ didn't _have a side any more. _Crowley _didn't have a side any more. They'd crossed the uncrossable line. They'd not only waded through the Rubicon, but poured oil on it and set it alight. They'd not only stepped outside of the circle in the sand, but had left it with a rude picture and the words _"Suck it" _drawn inside.

Neither of them had a side anymore, and neither of them were safe. Both of them were targets. Both of them were renegades. Both of them were, basically, _fucked _.

"We're on our own side."

And in the eyes of Heaven, and in the eyes of Hell, this was true.

And if it was true in the eyes of Heaven, and if it was true in the eyes of Hell, then that was that. They had nothing left. They had _nothing left to lose _.

Needing to keep Crowley safe had always superseded wanting to keep Crowley close. But now Crowley wasn't safe, and that was out of Aziraphale's hands. Now Crowley was here, and imploring, and so _near _, and what happened next _was _in Aziraphale's hands. He wasn't sure he wanted that kind of responsibility.

_The price of getting what you want is getting what you once wanted. _Aziraphale had read that somewhere, once*.

"Like Agnes said, we're going to have to choose our faces wisely."

Well, he was already on the ride. Perhaps it was time for one last spin.

Crowley held up his hand and the bus pulled over in front of them.

Perhaps it was time to pay up.


	12. The Gilded Cage

oOo

**The Gilded Cage**

On the bus, Crowley sat down first, swinging himself around the holding-bar and into the window seat with an effortlessly serpentine grace. He looked up at Aziraphale without moving his head, as if hoping his dark glasses would render the anxious glance invisible to the Angel. They didn't.

Aziraphale answered Crowley's unasked question by sitting down in the seat next to him.

Usually, when compelled to use public transportation, they sat separately. Seats adjacent or behind, ostensibly to avoid being conspicuous in case any agents of Heaven or Hell were watching. In hindsight, Aziraphale thought, their lengthy dinners at various and very public restaurants, their walks in the park, picnics in the countryside, museum visits, theatre trips, concerts, and all-night drinking sessions in the back of his bookshop (_don't think about the bookshop _) were probably somewhat more conspicuous than sitting together on a bus would have been, but somehow it always felt like a step too far. A line that, once crossed, would be rather difficult to explain away.

Aziraphale liked being able to explain things away. He always had an explanation prepared, in case anyone asked. People, even Angels, rarely did bother asking about him and Crowley, in actuality. And when they did, they usually tuned out as soon as he began recounting his detailed and immaculately believable lies - not _lies _\- his _explanations _. Nevertheless, he still liked to have such explanations prepared. It gave him peace of mind.

He'd never been able to come up with a good reason to sit next to Crowley on the bus. Not one that had any internal logic. Not one that would, in theory at least, make the questioner say "_ahhhh of course! Now it all makes sense. You, an Angel, were sitting so close to Crowley, a Demon, on the bus for the simple and naturally Angelically Good reason that -"... _

But now, he found, he had a perfectly reasonable explanation for doing so. He didn't know why he hadn't thought of it before. It was short, succinct, and striking in its sincerity.

He sat next to Crowley because he wanted to.

Crowley didn't look at Aziraphale as he took the seat beside him. He kept staring straight ahead, chin raised, posture rigid, hands on his knees. Aziraphale leaned in against Crowley's shoulder, without intention but also without restraint. The proximity was reassuring, his warmth comforting. A part of Aziraphale was worried that he was being too, what was the word, forward? Was that the correct term? Too personal? Too close? But another, larger, much more demanding part of him was just too exhausted to care.

Aziraphale didn't usually need comforting, not in the way that humans did. He didn't go in for arm squeezes, or pats on the back, or hugs. He didn't ever feel the need for a shoulder to cry on, a hand to hold, or a forehead to kiss or be kissed. Humans were so persistently physical with each other. He could see the appeal, theoretically speaking. Looking at it academically, that is. Humans were social creatures, and they required physical contact. A firm embrace from a loved one released various neurotransmitters like oxytocin and serotonin and other things that made them feel happier and helped them to relax and lowered their risk of heart disease. Not all humans were partial to physical contact, of course, but most required it at least occasionally. Aziraphale didn't.

Usually when he was feeling particularly unhappy, or stressed, or angry, or anxious, or theologically confused, or any other of the myriad overwhelming feelings which plagued him periodically, he simply retreated into his books. Or to sushi, or cocoa with whipped cream and marshmallows, or to a hot bubble bath scented with lavender and malt (Aziraphale hadn't had a hand in creating _Lush _, but he was certainly a cornerstone of their Soho branch's yearly profit margins). At one point he'd gotten into dancing, and that had proved an excellent diversion, but then his preferred dance had gone out of fashion and he'd stopped. He had also been rather fond of hashish, but after it was criminalised in the 1920s his anxiety over what might happen should an Angel get arrested on drug charges ruined his enjoyment of it, and so he'd decided to just stick with red wine.

None of these things fixed his problems, of course, but they gave his mostly-human body an acceptable dopamine hit sufficient to get him through the worst of it. At the very least they distracted him for a while.

Crowley helped, too. Not by giving him that distracting dopamine rush, or making him forget his problems, but - well, no, admittedly he _sometimes_ did that. He did that when the Angel had silly little overblown problems. When he was fretting over some minor, insignificant thing, or making mountains out of molehills. On those occasions Crowley would laugh at him, and listen to him, and invite him to dinner, or to play chess, or just out for a walk. They'd talk about it, or they wouldn't, and Aziraphale would leave lighter for it.

But when the problems weren't so silly or little, and they so often weren't, Crowley was still there. He wouldn't laugh, or distract him, but he would listen. He would ask questions. "_ Why _" this, and "_wh__at about _" that. He'd push Aziraphale's buttons and push him to unravel his thoughts. Push him to think about things he didn't want to think about. Things that he needed to think about. It usually wasn't easy, and it certainly didn't give him that distracting serotonin rush, but it _helped _.

Crowley never fixed Aziraphale's problems for him. He never made them go away. Not _those _kinds of problems, anyway. Not the existential ones. Instead, he helped Aziraphale to see that he could fix them by himself. He showed him that all doors could be opened. And when Aziraphale wouldn't listen, or couldn't bring himself to look, Crowley would still be there. His presence was never conditional. Crowley was always there.

Always there, that is, since this ridiculous fiasco of "_ Armageddon _" began. Since Warlock, and since Nanny Ashtoreth and Brother Francis, and Mr Harrison and Mr Cortese, and that whole _not-actually-the-Antichrist _debacle. Since their misguided masterplan to save the world together.

Before that Aziraphale had mostly dealt with his problems alone. Mostly. Crowley would be around, periodically, and they would get together to eat, drink, and have deep discussions long into the night that left Aziraphale feeling both intensely relieved and distressingly confused, but there would often be months between their meetings. Years, even. Decades. Most of the 19th century, in fact. That's not to say Crowley didn't help him, back then - Paris 1793 and London 1941 spring to mind in particular - but it was _different _.

Since the Antichrist's arrival on earth, barely a week would go by without them seeing each other. Often not even a day would pass where they didn't at least speak to each other. They'd worked together in the same house for eleven years. _Lived _in the same house for much of that time. And they'd raised a _child _together for Goodness' (or Evilness') sake. For the first time they'd been all-in. For the first time they'd been completely on the same page. For the first time it had really and truly felt like they were on _their own side _. For eleven years.

Eleven out of six thousand. That was nothing. Not even a drop in the ocean, in the grand scheme of things. And yet Aziraphale could barely remember what it was like not having Crowley constantly around. What it was like without Crowley always being there.

No, that wasn't true. He could remember. And it had been fine. Heaven had kept him on a loose enough leash, and if he had troubling questions and if he had cause to doubt, he always had _Ineffability _to shield him. To keep the lock on the door. He had been fine. The world had still been a fascinating, comfortable, diverting place filled with things like avocado toast and regency snuffboxes and the Oxford Regatta and Paris.

And he'd still had Crowley. He'd always had Crowley, ever since the Garden really, or ever since Rome, just in smaller doses. He had looked forward to their meetings, had been thrilled by their unplanned encounters, enjoyed whatever time they could spend together. And if their conversations sometimes left him without answers he could accept, and if the existence and growing intensity of their friendship ever made him feel ill at ease, well, he had miracles to perform and quotas to fill, cocktails to drink and books to read instead of thinking about it. He had been fine, before. He hadn't been unhappy.

But then again, he hadn't known better, either.

Was this what it was like for Eve, he wondered, when she paid for her knowledge with her place in the gilded cage? Did she ever look back on her time in the Garden and wonder why she left? Did she ever wonder why it had taken her _so long to_ _leave_?

There was no gilded cage with Crowley. No shield from uncomfortable truths, no locks to keep questions chained deep below the surface, no door to close on anything that didn't quite fit. Aziraphale had always had a tendency toward agoraphobia. He could never bring himself to step out of his cage and into the unknown, alone.

Crowley didn't look at Aziraphale as the Angel slipped their hands together, interlocking their fingers and squeezing. He sat looking straight ahead, chin raised, posture rigid. Crowley didn't even turn his head.

But he did squeeze back.


	13. Mine

oOo

**Mine**

Aziraphale was bracing himself for the crash. The come down. The jolt as the bus broke through the protective boundary Adam had placed around his home. His village. His Town...? His… _entire county of Oxfordshire_? How far did the boy's reach stretch?

The spell continued. Unending, unlimited, unbroken.

_This is mine and you can't have it._

Defying all expectation, love, pure and possessive continued to thrum like electricity through the air. The earth continued to turn.

_This is mine and you can't have it _.

The Angel kept waiting, but there was no harsh withdrawal, no splash of icy water dragging him out of his dream-state. No '_ back to reality _' as the grim, empty, loveless universe pulled him back into its cold embrace. It didn't make sense. By the time the bus had passed beyond the far side of Uxbridge, it was clear that something didn't fit. Something had been missed. Some piece of the puzzle was out of place.

_This is mine and you can't have it _.

The bus rumbled through Mayfair and pulled to a stop outside of Crowley's apartment building.

Love, pure and protective continued to thrum like electricity. Through the air. Through the world. Through Aziraphale's fingertips.

_This is mine _, it echoed.

_This is mine, and you can't have him._


	14. Dynamite

oOo

**Dynamite**

They reached Crowley's flat.

Mouth dry and throat tight, Crowley led the Angel through the gated entrance way of the apartment building and up to the top floor. _Muzak _played in the lift, incongruously upbeat. Everything was beginning to feel a bit like a dream again. Reverberations buzzed through Crowley's fingertips.

They reached the door.

"Oh, my," Aziraphale said, the first thing either of them had said since they'd arrived. Since they'd left Tadfield, in fact. "Your door is broken."

It was indeed broken. A grimy smudge of a footprint decorated the now-useless lock. _They could have miracled it open _, Crowley thought. _They didn't have to break it. They had a choice._

"Yeah," Crowley muttered. He pushed past the Angel and pushed open the door and pushed into his flat. Aziraphale followed.

Inside, Crowley watched as Aziraphale took off his shoes. Crowley didn't know why he did that. He didn't have to take his shoes off. He could wear shoes in the flat. Crowley always did. It made the Angel seem so much smaller, and so much more vulnerable. So much more _real _. Crowley wished he hadn't.

Aziraphale placed his shoes neatly beneath Crowley's statue of _Good Wrestling With Evil _, and stood back up straight, smoothing out a crease in his waistcoat. Crowley tossed his jacket at the hook on the back of the door, and didn't pick it up when it fell to the floor. Aziraphale glanced at it, but said nothing, instead turning his attention to Crowley's plants.

"These are coming along marvellously, Crowley," he said, walking up to the indoor Garden, as though the world hadn't nearly been destroyed. As though none of this was outside of the usual.

"I can never get anything to grow as well as you can, you really have quite the green thumb," he said, as though he weren't standing in his plaid-knit socks in Crowley's flat. As though he hadn't taken Crowley's hand on a public bus and held on so tightly that he left imprints in the skin.

"You will have to come and take a look at the little orchid I have in the -"

Aziraphale stopped. A shadow passed over his face and he closed his eyes for just a second. Then he opened them again.

"Truly marvellous plants, my dear. They do you a great credit," he said, wearing a too-bright and too-brittle smile.

Crowley could still feel the warmth of the Angel's palm pressed against his own. The heat from the flames as windows smashed and priceless pages curled and burned and walls came crashing down. His fingertips pressing down on his knuckles. The weight of the world pressing down on his shoulders. And then it wasn't. And then they weren't.

Crowley clenched his jaw.

"Plants," he said, flatly.

Aziraphale inspected a leaf, industriously ignoring the growing air of tension.

"Mmhm."

"My plants. You are talking about my..."

Crowley's sentence trailed off in very much the same way that a small spark trails off upon meeting a length of potassium-nitrate soaked cotton, plodding along lackadaisically until meeting its final destination in a stick of dynamite.

Aziraphale coughed.

Crowley exploded.


	15. Overkill

oOo

**Overkill**

Crowley realised that he was babbling, but he couldn't stop himself. He had, physically, if not metaphysically, stopped racing head on into chaos and oblivion, for the time being at least. But unfortunately, due to some sort of bloody-minded psychological and hormonal physics, that same forward momentum which had been keeping him more or less on his feet throughout, well, everything, was now refusing to steady up the pace a bit. At all.

Here he was, alive. And there was Aziraphale, alive. And there was the world, and all of the humans, and all of everything, just being all _alive _. It was too much for him to process. An eleven year old boy had just averted the end of the world. The _wrong _eleven year old boy. Aziraphale had gone, and then he had come back, and then he came _properly _back, and now he was following him, Crowley, into his, Crowley's, office, wearing an infuriating expression of anxious concern on his, Aziraphale's, beautiful - not beautiful, _annoying _face.

Within the last 24 hours (was that really all it was?) Crowley had made open and actively hostile enemies of both Heaven and Hell and the myriad legions therein. He had faced down Satan himself, armed only with a tyre iron from his Bentley and the friendship of a really pissed off angel. That mad American woman with the bicycle had been there, for some reason. There had been tornadoes and Tibetans and the M25 was burning and Aziraphale's bookshop was burning and the whole world was burning, and then it wasn't. He'd held hands with an Angel on a bus. And - Oh. Yes. His Bentley. His beloved Bentley.

His Bentley had exploded.

It was, quite simply, all far, far too much for him to deal with right now. Now that he was, relatively speaking, safe on home turf. Now that he was back, that they _both _were back, back and standing in his sparse, quiet, entirely unruffled flat. Now that everything was pretending to be back to the usual. It was just too much. Far, far too much.

"And your shop was on_ fire _!" Crowley gesticulated in broad sweeps as his voice escalated in volume and pitch. "And I ran in and was hoping, was thinking, you know, maybe you were still in there, trapped or tied up or trying to rescue some of your books or something _stupid _, but there was just the fire, and the falling roof, and all of the burning books and I didn't know whether my lot had taken you or your lot had got you, all I knew is that you were gone, completely gone, dead for all I knew, for all I believed. I thought you had _died _, Aziraphale," Crowley stammered as his mouth tried to catch up with his thoughts. " _Without me _."

Aziraphale's eyes widened, and Crowley's tirade crashed on.

"And, of course, I had just used up all of your holy water on Ligur, which, in retrospect, was a bit of an overkill." He laughed, manically. "Overkill, geddit? Because - oh doesn't matter, what I _mean _is that all of the blessed stuff was _gone _. Wassssted."

Crowley gulped and he turned his head towards the spot on the floor where he had watched Ligur melt into a screaming puddle of oblivion. "Makesssss one glad not to have gone for carpet."

He was starting to hiss his esses.

Aziraphale tried and failed to follow the increasingly tangential threads of his friend's apparent emotional breakdown. The Angel couldn't deal with this, although that was nothing out of the usual. He wasn't very good at handling such situations at the best of times, and this was emphatically not the best of times. It had very closely avoided being the _end _of times.

"Crowley, you are far too worked up, my dear. Why don't I go and make us both a -"

"And you were _gone! _" The demon interjected, laughing, or hyperventilating, or both. "Just gone! Poof! Up in ssssmoke, as it were!"

He began pacing the room, chasing his thoughts, planning to pin them down and make them suffer horribly for disobeying him and pouring out of his mouth without permission. But they went too fast for him. Aziraphale had said that to him, once. That he went too fast. Maybe he was right. Maybe he was -

"And- and- and- and I couldn't do anything about it! No leads, no plan, no- no- no-, no _nothing! _And then I couldn't help but think that it was my fault, that I should have perssssuaded you to come with me, or- or- or- or kidnapped you or something, or ss _stayed _. Or _anything! _Then maybe your shop wouldn't have been on fire and the world- Well, the world probably would have still been on fire. Or maybe it wouldn't. Ineffability and all that."

"Crowley, I really think that you ought to -"

"Shakespeare!" Crowley spun on his heels and pointed at Aziraphale with both hands.

"I'm sorry?"

"That, you know, that comedy. You know the one. Was it a comedy? _I _thought it was rather funny, in a morbid kind of way. Big hit. Argh, what was it called? With the idiot girl and that sstupid boy, you know, and she pretends to be dead because of the priest, and they aren't allowed to be together, and then he diessss, and I think there is a car chase or something, and - What _was _it called?"

"Romeo and Juliet?" Aziraphale supplied. He didn't know why they were now discussing Shakespeare, but any port in a storm. "I'm not sure that it was a comedy, though."

"Doesn't matter. Point _is _that if the idiot boy, Romeo?" He glanced at Aziraphale, who nodded. "If Juliet had been all, like, you know, ' _Oh I think I won't actually give him that nice knife he wanted even though he says it's just for insssurance and won't do anything stupid with it I don't trussst him because he is an idiot and knives are dangerous and who knows what sort of trouble one can get into with a knife hanging about' _then maybe when he thought sssshe was dead he would have said, _'oh, blast, I really wish I could jussst kill myself right now because what is the point of exissssting anymore when everything that makes anything worth anything hassssss disssssssappeared but oh no I can't because I used my knife to stab -' _What was that guy's name? Tyler?"

Aziraphale was adrift. "Tybalt. But Romeo didn't stab himself, he -"

"Whatever. Tybalt. Sso Romeo would be all, '_ Oh, I used my knife to kill Tybalt so I guesss I'll just go and get drunk and wait for the world to end insstead _.' And _then _, when Juliet reappears, alive, they would both have a good laugh over it, and- and- and-, like, ' _ha ha wasn't that a bit of luck that you just got drunk in a pub and cried about it instead of killing yourself, what a mess we would have been in then, ha ha ha _'. You see what I'm ssssaying? Much better ending. Much prefer the comedies."

Silence fell over the space between them like an unexpected snowfall in Spring. The only sounds to be heard were Crowley's rapid breathing and the gentle hum of the midnight Mayfair traffic on the streets far below.

Crowley licked his lips nervously.

Yes. It was all far, far too much to deal with.

"Oh. Oh, Crowley…"

A strangled sort of sound escaped from the Demon's throat. He grimaced and waved his hands dismissively. Throwing himself down onto his elaborately ornate desk chair he sat, sprawling. He stared at the wall, at nothing, at anything but the Angel. Yanking off his sunglasses, he tossed them onto the desk with such force that they skidded over the edge and landed on the floor with a terminal crunch.

"Th'kitchen'sssss across the hall," he muttered, gesturing in the appropriate direction, not looking up. "If you want tea, or cocoa, or… whatever."

Resting his forehead on the back of his hand, Crowley covered his eyes.


	16. Feelings, God Forbid

oOo

**Feelings, God Forbid**

Aziraphale hesitated. He shuffled on the spot, balling and unballing his fists at his sides. He really ought to say something, he was well aware. Something reassuring, perhaps, or comforting. Or apologetic.

Apologetic. Yes, apologetic.

Guilt and regret and sadness and a hundred other unresolved emotions pulsed through Aziraphale with each disconcertingly elevated heartbeat. He needed to apologise. He _wanted_to apologise. But how could he even begin to do that? Even the word itself was grossly inadequate. The Angel wasn't certain that _any _words could _ever _be adequate. How could mere_words _, faulting, failing words, be used to explain, and justify, and lament, and elaborate upon… On _anything. _On any of it. Let alone on his _feelings _, God forbid. Which She probably would, all things considered.

But this was _Crowley _...

He really ought to say something. Something honest, and dangerous, and at least a few hundred years overdue. Something that would begin with an apology, and end with, with -

Well.

Aziraphale shook himself internally as the rationalisations of self doubt regained their footholds in his mind. That just wasn't their way. Crowley never asked for thanks, never needed any apology. Never wanted -

And it was all implied, in any case, was it not? Saying such things out loud, it just wasn't the done thing. At least not sober, anyway. Not without the security of mutual plausible deniability. Surely Crowley knew that, well, that he was- That Aziraphale never- That they were -

No. Enunciating such things would do no good. It wasn't their way. Far too maudlin. Far too… It would only complicate matters.

"Ah. Yes. Quite. Would you like anything?"

Crowley shrugged and mumbled something unintelligible.

And Aziraphale didn't say:

_'I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything, Crowley. I'm sorry for not trusting you, for never trusting you, for not wanting to trust you. For always trying to find any reason to distrust you. I'm sorry I lied to you and I'm sorry I left you. I'm sorry I put my faith in the most undeserving of people instead of with the only one who ever truly earned it. I'm sorry that in trying to protect you, I became the one to put you in the most danger. I became the one who hurt you the most. I am so sorry for ever hurting you. I'm sorry I let how I thought things ought to be stop me from seeing the truth in front of me. And I'm sorry I said I didn't like you. I do like you, Crowley, I like you ever so much. And I am so very, very, very sorry.'_

What he did say was:

"Quite. Right. Yes. This way then. I'll just go and, um. Right. Yes."

And he turned, and walked away, and pretended he didn't hate himself.


	17. Tricky Bugger

oOo

Tricky Bugger 

Crowley's kitchen was as sleek and as elegant as the rest of his flat. The granite worktops glistened with the kind of pristine perfection that only comes from rarely being used. Only a small space around the complicated looking espresso machine near the large bay window indicated, with its spilled coffee grounds and traces of limescale on the water trap, that the kitchen was ever used at all.

Aziraphale filled the kettle.

"I suppose actual cocoa would be too much to hope for…" he mumbled to himself distractedly as he looked through Crowley's sparsely stocked cupboards.

"Marmite, hot sauce, candied tofu?" Aziraphale winced. "What on earth does the dear boy eat?"

Further investigation finally revealed, shoved in a back corner behind a half-empty packet of animal-shaped pasta, a small brown box of tea. It was decorated with flowers and the type of geometric designs that suit-wearing small-business owners tended to think of as _"Aztec" _.

"Cocoa nib, cinnamon, and chili tea…" Aziraphale read to himself, holding the box away from his face. He didn't have his glasses. "I suppose this will have to do..."

He pulled two teabags from their gaudy box and dropped them into a matching pair of sleek, dark grey mugs. Aziraphale absentmindedly turned the box over in his hands as he waited for the kettle to boil. It was covered in those so called "_words of wisdom _"; vague platitudes popular with the kind of people who enjoy telling their friends that they are _"really into meditation now, man _" whilst wearing harem pants and overpriced sweatshop jewelry marketed as "tribal". Words written, apparently, by some kind of automatic generating machine.

_Empty yourself and let the universe fill you... _

_Love is to live for each other... _

_Together we can do what we can never do alone... _

_Realise that the other person is you _…*

Aziraphale viewed these as a connoisseur of vintage wines might view a box of _Tesco's Own Red _.

_" _Nonsense," Aziraphale muttered under his breath. "Cryptic, pseudo-philosophical, meaningless…" He trailed off as his mind began to wander.

It wandered head on into what he had termed "_Agnes' Last Prophecy _".

He leapt at this new avenue of thought like a starving man leaps at scraps of bread. Aziraphale was comfortable with prophecies and puzzles and suchlike. They could completely occupy his mind, leaving no space for anything else. No space for any distressing or inconvenient thoughts. No space for distressing or inconvenient _feelings _.

_When alle is sayed and all is done, ye must choose your faces wisely, for soon enouff ye will be playing with fyre. _

"What does that _mean _, Agnes?"

Aziraphale worried at a corner of the box until he ripped it clean off. He didn't notice, and just began rolling and unrolling the shred of cardboard between his thumb and forefinger.

"'_Playing with fire _'... That could be a warning, or a metaphor, or even something laterally literal, if the other prophecies are anything to go by…Paper, paper, I need -"

He glanced around the room and spotted the unused memo-sheet magnet-pad stuck lopsidedly to Crowley's expensive looking fridge. Every fifteen sheets or so the colour changed to the next shade of the rainbow. There was a little cartoon snake along the bottom edge, and if you flicked the pages fast enough, the little snake danced along from right to left and back again. Aziraphale had given it to Crowley in the late 70s.

The Angel ripped off several pages, pulled the polka dot pen out of its holder, and began furiously writing notes. Soon he had finished with the Green sheets and was making solid headway into Blue.

"'_Choose your faces wisely'... _ Faces can refer to edges, boundaries, sides… Did she mean we must choose sides? Bit bloody late for that..." Aziraphale muttered to himself as he scribbled down copious notes bordering on the incomprehensible.

"'_We're on our own side, now'. _That's what Crowley said at the bus stop.. _. _" Aziraphale chewed the inside of his cheek. "Was that what Agnes meant? Did Crowley fall over the answers, again?"

Aziraphale wouldn't be surprised if he had. Crowley could always see those things that the Angel had missed, always pointed out the invisible and made them the obvious. He was so perspicacious, so casually clever, so nonchalantly genius, so _wily… _Aziraphale shook his head and reminded himself to stay on topic.

"'_Playing with fire'... _to play with fire is to take foolish risks, high risks with low or no reward, be incautious, impetuous, improvident... But why would we do that? We wouldn't do that... I don't think. Would we?" The Angel winced. "Well. We'll just put a pin in that one, then."

"What else, what else... It's a... metaphor for danger, a warning to children, perhaps a symbol of rebirth? In folk magic and folklore fire often stands for, for... for death and rebirth, creation from destruction…_ The hare runs into the fire it takes her she is not burned**... _Where did I read that? Oh it doesn't matter, think, Aziraphale, _think… _If only I had my _books..." _

_No. Too painful. Bad avenue. Back up. _

"Fire, then. Fire in history? Fire in mythology…Surt was a fire giant who was to challenge the Gods at Ragnarok, was supposed to bring forth '_flames to engulf the earth _'... he had a flaming sword too, if I recall correctly. And the Aztecs had Huehueteotl, a fire God who kept the world in balance and who demanded the hearts of sacrificial victims to be ripped still-beating from their chests and roasted alive, lovely. Or... Prometheus? Prometheus stole fire from the Gods for mankind out of compassion and was condemned to suffer hideously until the end of time, not in death but trapped in eternal torture…"

Aziraphale sighed and scrubbed his eyes with his hands. No matter where he went with this, the implications just seemed to get worse.

He stared down at his notes to see if he could make any sense of them, see if he could pick up on anything he had noticed but not noticed. Anything that his subconscious had spelled out for him that he, yet again, had managed to miss.

The Angel raised an eyebrow. Staring at the nearest post-it note (it was pink), he found that he had drawn a little quiff and sunglasses onto the cartoon snake. He had drawn on all of the snakes in fact: ringlets on one; shoulder-length waves peppered with braids on another; another with little curls and a laurel wreath. One in the ridiculous yet strangely compelling garb of a Parisian revolutionary, one with a jaunty little goatee, another in a top hat, and another still with hair like Ringo Starr and glasses like John Lennon. He hadn't realised he'd done that.

There were also a great number with both demonic horns _and _angelic halos, which would have given him a great deal to think about had he not been presently inundated with what he considered more pressing concerns.

The subconscious is a tricky bugger.

He also hadn't realised the chaos he'd enacted on Crowley's perfect kitchen. The doodles and the pages lay scattered around him, on the countertops, on the floor, one had even found it's way into the sink. The box of tea had been inadvertently knocked over at some point, and it's contents were spilling out into haphazard piles of little maroon tea packets.

Aziraphale sighed and tidied them up. He opened the cabinet and pushed the box back onto a shelf.

"I'm overthinking it," he said into the open cupboard. "This isn't how the prophecies work. If you think too closely they slip away from you. Agnes was a sly old witch. I can't fight against her, I have to fight _with _her. Can't _control _it, have to stare it openly in the face..."

He cracked his knuckles.

"Okay Agnes. We'll play it your way."


	18. Bite of the Apple

oOo

**Bite Of The Apple**

Aziraphale closed his eyes and focused on his breathing. He leaned his elbows on the countertop and rested his head in his hands. He needed to let the answers come to him. He had them, somewhere, he _knew _he did. He just had to stop looking. He only had to turn the lock-

A nasty, officious, insidious sort of a voice suddenly marched into Aziraphale's thoughts. It stood in the metaphorical doorway of his mind, arms barring entry and exit. Stopping him from moving forwards. Stopping him from moving at all.

Doubt.

_Seriously, Aziraphale? _Doubt said. The voice was smug and superior, and for some reason it had an American accent. It made Aziraphale want to straighten his bow tie. It made him worry about his hair. _What little plan do you have now? You're going to save yourselves, just like you saved the world? That's cute. It really is. You have to admire optimism. Although, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Antichrist actually stop the Apocalypse? Remind me again what impact you have actually had on anything? For the "good", I mean. I'm sure we are both fully aware of your mistakes, Aziraphale. They're pretty difficult to forget. All I'm saying is that your track record… Not so great. I'm just suggesting that you might want to reconsider your… capabilities. _

The Angel tried in vain to ignore them. Ignore his Doubts. But they were so loud. They were so _persuasive _.

_Think about it. I'm on your side, here. I'm I trying to help you. Why are you so defensive? How about we try being a little more sensible for a change, hm? Let's take stock of your shortcomings, shall we? Just the biggest things, of course. We don't have all day. _

_You've 1: Rebelled against Heaven. Yeah, ouch, that's a big one. That one is gonna sting. Good luck with that. Worked out for the last lot. _

_You have, 2: Stood in the way of God's Great Plan. Again: Ouch. That one won't win you many friends upstairs _or _downstairs. Well done there, genius. And how arrogant can you get, by the way? Defying God herself? That's... Just, wow. I wish I had that kind of self-confidence. You must be absolutely 100% certain that you know exactly what you're doing. Because, I mean, if you weren't, that would be... just... whew! But I'm sure you know what you are doing. I'm sure you have a plan. Right, Aziraphale?_

_You have, 3: Befriended a Demon. _

_That third one is my favourite. That's brilliant. Honestly, I haven't laughed so hard since the time Michael dropped in unexpectedly and caught you getting drunk with Oscar Wilde. A Demon, really? That's the creature you chose to desperately and pathetically latch on to? I mean, aside from everything else wrong with that (and there is _so _much wrong with that, just so you are aware), do you realise how incredibly _selfish _you have been? I mean, Heaven, they're the Good Guys. They might slap you on the wrist, maybe demote you, make your existence vaguely unpleasant (although, just for the record, they might have to make an exception in your case, after this little episode. I hope you feel special). But Hell? Oh, if Hell found out what you'd been up to with your little boyfriend, they'd go to _town _. I'm talking an eternity of tortures for your pet Snake. All because of you. All because you were so selfish in seeking out his friendship. It's brilliant, honestly. I love a good tragedy. Molto divertente. I will watch his future career with interest. And marshmallows. Get it? To toast on the fires of Hell? When they inevitably torture him forever with it? And I sit and watch? Yeah, I know, I know, I should be doing stand-up comedy. I crack me up! Although, I'm not sure you even _need_ Hell to torture him. Seems like you've done a pretty solid job of that yourself, if that breakdown he just had is anything to go by. You might be in the wrong job, Aziraphale. You should be on more active duty. Destroying demons seems to be your forte._

_And now what? After all that, you are going to save the day? Save him? With your silly little prophecy and your delusions of intelligence and heroism? My dear Aziraphale, I don't mean to be mean - hah hah, clever and witty, I love me - but you are destined to fail. It's too late, and you are simply not capable. Think back. Think back over this entire clusterfuck of a situation that you've put yourself into, and find me one thing you have done right. Go on. I'll wait. But you _can't _. This is all ridiculous, Aziraphale. You can't fight this. You have nothing. You are nothing. And you know that I'm right. Why are you trying to delay the inevitable? Why are you even trying at all? _

_(Give up.) _

_You are not clever. _

_(Give up.) _

_You are not capable. _

_(Give up.) _

_You are wrong. _

_(Give up.) _

_You are soft. _

_(Give up.) _

_You knew he loved you. You felt it pouring off of him, almost from the moment you met. And look what you've done with it. Look where you, in your wisdom, have led him. Selfish. Foolish. Unforgivable. _

_(Give up.) _

_You'll lose him. _

_Just like you've lost everything else. _

_(Give up.) _

_And it will all be your fault. _

Aziraphale felt tears prickling behind his eyes. He felt sick. Even though he knew that his doubts weren't right, that his anxieties were… were… But what if they _were _? They did have a point. Several, in fact. He had made so, so many foolish mistakes. He had been so afraid for so long, and he'd made so many bad decisions. He had been so _selfish _. He had not only endangered himself, but he'd put _Crowley _in danger, too. What was _wrong _with him? Why did he think for even a _second _that he could do this, that he could do _anything _? Maybe he _should _just give up... Maybe if he surrendered unconditionally, he could strike some kind of plea bargain, hand himself over in exchange for Crowley, or-

**Angel, shut up already.**

That was new.

**How can someone as clever as you be such a complete ****_idiot_**** ?**

Wonderful. Another one. Who was this, Aziraphale's Anxiety? Feelings Of Inadequacy? Guilt? Fear? Need For Moral Superiority? The Angel had a laundry list of insecurities a mile long, this voice could be any one of them. And it sounded so acerbic, so sarcastic, so _dramatic. _Yet so familiar, too. God, Aziraphale was _tired _...

**No, stop being tired. Stop giving in. Stop listening to Doubt, angel, he's a smug git who never says anything worth the - well I was going to say '****_anything worth the breath it takes him to say it'_**** , but as this is all in your mind, I suppose it doesn't take him any breath at all, does it? Look, what I mean is, stop paying attention to him, and tell him to, you know, just, mmnhhggnk, go ahead and fuck right off. Alright? You don't need that right now. Right now, you need to be clever. Right now you need to be tough. Right now you need to be just a bit of a bastard. You need to get yourself together. The Demon having a nervous breakdown across the hall? He needs you to get yourself together, Aziraphale.**

_I don't think I can… _The reply reverberated through every fibre of the Angel's being. ... _I can't. I can't! I don't think I can. _..

Or, with _almost _every fibre.

_Can I? _

**Okay, look, you're tired, and you're scared, and Doubt is getting to you. I get that. I understand. That's okay. And if you want to give up, you know what, that's okay too. But if you give up, you need to do it because ****_you_**** have decided to. Because ****_you_**** have made that choice. Not because Doubt has bludgeoned you into it. You need to make the choice ****_yourself_**** . And you need to do it with all the information on the table. **

**Listen up, angel, because I've got some Apples for you.**

**1: You haven't rebelled against Heaven. Or, you have, but- Look, this is in no way the same as what we- As what Lucifer ****_et. al._**** did, back in the day. That was about pride. That was about anger. That was about… Well, it was about lots of things. But it wasn't about compassion. It wasn't about ****_love_**** . It wasn't even about self-preservation, it- It wasn't the same. 'Cause you are ****_good_**** , Aziraphale. And if Heaven can't see that, then they ****_aren't_**** . They can't say that they are the Good Guys and do Bad Guy things*****. If Heaven sees your actions as Bad, then fuck 'em. You don't want to be aligned with people like that. You are ****_better_**** than that. You are better than ****_them_**** .**

**2: Stood in the way of the Great Plan. Angel, you answered this one yourself already, I don't know why you are giving your Doubt a free pass on this. The ****_Ineffable Plan_**** and the ****_Great Plan_**** , they aren't the same thing, are they? Clearly. And the Great Plan isn't ****_God's_**** plan. It's Heaven and Hell's plan, and we've seen what morons they are. So that one is moot at inception. **

**Golly, Doubt isn't doing so well now, are they? Where's your retort to that, hm? No smartmouth comebacks? No reply? Doubt? Hah!**

**And d'you know why that is, angel? Why that insidious little voice has gone quiet? It's because Doubt is ****_weak_**** . It's a ****_coward_**** . It acts strong, it acts like it has all the answers, but it doesn't. It doesn't have anything. All it does is** **_take_**** . **

**You can question things, angel, I'm not saying you shouldn't question things, far from it. But you can do it ****_yourself_**** . You can ask yourself whether you have been wrong, whether you have been foolish, or selfish, or ridiculous, without Doubt getting involved. 'Cause you will be all of those things, sometimes. We ****_all _****are, sometimes. But if you want to face facts, you have to face all of them, the Good as well as the Bad and the Ugly. And trust me, Aziraphale, the good outweighs the bad tenfold. And for all of the bad, well, you can't change that now. Can't change the past. But you can change the present so that when it becomes the past, it will be a past worth having******. You can change the past ****_now_**** , angel, before it happens.**

**You figured out Agnes' prophecies, before, didn't you? ****_Generations_**** of her descendants have been puzzling over that, for hundreds of years. You cracked it in a few days. And yes, you stood on their shoulders to do it. But you were ****_able _****to do that because you are humble, because you respect the knowledge of others. You acknowledge your own limitations, and ****_work with them_**** . You saw everything you were up against, and you ****_still figured it all out_**** . You didn't have to do that. You didn't have to do ****_any of_**** this. But you did. Because you are ****_clever_**** , Aziraphale. Because you are tenacious. Because you ****_care_**** . You've done it once, you can do it again. You are ****_capable_**** .**

**And 3: Yes. You befriended a Demon. **

**_And a Demon befriended you. _**

**Don't be so ****_arrogant_**** as to blame yourself for that. If "blame" even needs to be assigned. 'Cause, the thing is, you don't have that much control. You certainly don't have that much control over ****_him_**** . You didn't force him to join you at the Ritz. You didn't drag him back to your Bookshop all of those nights, or to Paris, or to all of those concerts, and picnics, and lazy afternoon strolls through the park. You didn't ask him to buy you chocolates to celebrate the Grand Opening of your shop, or to sit and talk with you for all of those endless hours when everything felt just a little too ****_much_**** . You didn't even approach him in Eden.**

**There was no manipulation involved. Only choice. Don't give yourself all the credit. Don't rob him of his agency. He ****_chose_**** to do all of that with you, ****_for _****you, and that's on him. Doesn't that tell you something? Doesn't that tell you that you are worth something? **

**You are not nothing.**

**_He_**** chose you. **

**He ****_cares_**** about you. **

**He always has.**

**And you've always known it, deep down. Don't forget it, not now. Not ever.**

**So, no, you don't have nothing, Aziraphale. You have him, and you have ****_yourself_**** . And you are fucking ****_brilliant_**** .**

**And, now, you also have a ****_choice_**** . But before you make it, all I ask is that you think back to all of the times that he has been there for you. All of the times that he has jumped in at the last minute to ****_save_**** you, even when it was difficult. Even when he could have walked away, or given up. Even when a part of him wanted to. Even when everything seemed hopeless. He had choices, and he made them, the same ones, time and time again. You've got a choice to make, angel. You have a choice, and ****_he _****needs** **_you._**

Aziraphale breathed deeply.

**You took a bite of this Apple a long time ago, Aziraphale. Isn't it about time you swallowed it?**

_Yes _, Aziraphale thought.

And with that, Doubt was gone. Not forever. Not for good. Not by a long shot. But just for now. Just for the moment. And that was enough. That was all Aziraphale needed. Just the moment. Just the now. Just that small spark of hope, shining out in the darkness. Just that tiny pinch of belief. Just that one streak of brazen bastardry squaring up and fighting back.

He could do this.

And then, slowly, other voices began to make themselves heard. And these were no longer manifestations of Aziraphale's own subconscious battling out his insecurities. These were memories. Flashbacks. Images, and sounds from the distant past and the recent past and everything in between.

Somewhere within him, Aziraphale knew, he would find the answers he needed. As long as he didn't bury them. As long as he didn't run from them. As long as he embraced the knowledge he had been so afraid of possessing.

Aziraphale swallowed his bite of the Apple.


	19. Get In, Angel

oOo

**Get In, Angel**

_..must have put it down somewhere forget my own.. ..the battle commences, Aziraphale... ..I don't even like you.. ..you were issued with a body!.. ..you will fail.. ..we'll be godfathers, sort of.. ..I've never had oysters...lose the gut?.. ..I think you have the wrong shop.. ..you can't kill kids.. ..sister slug.. ..where is your flaming sword?.. ..shoot him Aziraphale!.. ..foolish principalitee.. _

_..you go too fast for me Crowley.. ..come to smirk at the poor bugger?.. ..not anymore, it's over!.. ..I lost my best friend.. ...we can save everyone... ..you pathetic excuse for an angel.. ..I suppose I am.. ..all the other wordzz I have for you are worszzze... _

_...little demonic miracle of my own.. ….why're we talking about this good and evil? they're just names for sides. we know that… ...what're you going to do you can't possess them.. ..foolish principalitee.. ...run away together?… ..maybe you should just keep your mouth shut.. ..Crowley. the traitor.. ...the holiest... ..a four letter word.. ..you were an angel once... ..we have a lot in common, you and I.. ..open thine eyes... _

_..get in, angel... … all have miraculous escapes.. ..demons can.. ...I forgive you... ..I'm not giving you a suicide pill.. ..we're on our side.. ..choose your faces wisely.. ..we'll go off together.. ...look, wherever you are, I'll come to you… ...open thine eyes... _

_..soon enouff ye shal be playing with fyre.. ..dressed like that he's asking for trouble.. ...we have a lot in common, you and I.. ..pity I can't inhabit yours.. ...it's like Agnes said... ..demons can.. ..you were an angel once.. ...playing with fyre… ..choose your faces wisely.. ...get in, angel... ..pity I can't inhabit yours.. ...get IN, angel… ._

..._Inhabit Yours..._

_...Playing With Fyre..._

_...Get In Angel..._

_...foolish principalitee open THINE EYES thy cocoa doth grow cold! _


	20. Just A WikiHow Away

oOo

**Just A WikiHow Away**

"Aziraphale?"

The Angel jolted upright. Or rather, he was about to jolt upright but found his endeavour scuppered at the outset when the top of his head decided to have a short, sharp rendezvous with the bottom of the cupboard door.

"Ow! Bugger!"

Crowley spluttered, coughing back nervous laughter that he didn't mean but couldn't quite suppress. He'd only come out to the kitchen to see what the hell was taking so long. To check that the Angel wasn't breaking his very expensive espresso machine. Instead he'd found him leaning face-down over the dishwasher, surrounded by a rainbow of paper covered in erratic, spidery notes and drawings of snakes that looked like, well, _him _. Crowley was getting concerned about Aziraphale's head even before it smacked into the cabinet door.

"Angel, are you… alright?"

Aziraphale straightened up, throwing a dark look at the cupboard door as if it were somehow to blame, and rubbed the back of his head.

"Blasted thing," he hissed viciously under his breath.

Crowley felt the corners of his mouth twitch. Only Aziraphale could make "_ blasted thing _" sound like a curse worthy of Satan himself. One of many things that had always endeared him to the angel. But now wasn't the time.

Crowley took a cautious step closer to Aziraphale. He then promptly jumped back a few feet when the Angel snapped back to laser-focused lucidity with a start.

"I've figured it out," he declared, staring intensely at Crowley, eyes aflame. "We need to possess each other."

Crowley raised his eyebrows. Then lowered them. Then pulled them together. Then raised one by itself. He had very eloquent eyebrows.

"You_ what _?"

"Possess each other. That's the answer. That's what she means. I've figured it out."

"Riiiiiight… Okay."

Crowley leaned up onto his tiptoes and tried to get a closer look at the spot where Aziraphale's head had collided with the hardwood cabinet.

"Angel…" he said, using the calm and patient tone he'd heard paramedics using on _Inside The Ambulance _, "I think we need to get you to have a l _ittle sit down _."

Crowley cautiously placed a hand on Aziraphale's shoulder. He was planning on gently leading him into the living room, whereupon he fully intended to test for signs of concussion. Crowley wasn't entirely sure _how _one tested for signs of concussion, but getting the injured party sitting down was _probably _a good start. From there he would be just a _WikiHow _away from figuring out the rest. Probably. Couldn't be that hard. Could do anything, with the internet.

Aziraphale had other plans. He shrugged the Demon off with no small degree of irritation and glared in that steely way Crowley always greatly enjoyed when the Angel directed it at others, but enjoyed a great deal less when it was levelled at himself.

"Crowley. I'm serious."

Crowley gave a small nod, and definitely did not whimper. "Yep. Okay. Serious. Got it. Serious and definitely not concussed. Right. Fine. I believe you."

Aziraphale ignored him.

"Agnes' last prophecy. I think I've figured it out. This isn't over, you were right about that. Both sides were denied their Holy -"

"Or Unholy."

"- their Holy_ or Unholy _war, but they are all still fired up. Still out for blood. And they will be looking for someone to blame."

"I could have told you that, angel. In fact I did, didn't I? If you needed some bloody _prophecy _to get that into your skull, then you are more of a -"

"Shut _up _Crowley, just listen, will you!"

Crowley shut up.

"The _point is _, as you so rightly pointed out, that this is by no means over. They will be coming for us. And what do you think they will do if they apprehend us?"

"When they apprehend us."

"_ When _they apprehend us, Crowley, they won't be content with a sternly worded lecture. I've learned at least that much…" He gritted his teeth. No time for that. Be angry later. "The thing is, I don't think Agnes was being metaphorical, at least not entirely. She was far too clever for that. I think she meant every word she said. That message was for _us. _The last bit was _for me _. _Playing with fire _, Crowley."

The words settled in the air like sparks on kindling. Crowley shook his head.

"Not...?"

Aziraphale nodded.

"But- but- but where would they even -"

"I don't know how they'll get hold of it, but they will. They have their channels. _Hellfire _, Crowley. Total annihilation. They want revenge, absolute and final."

Crowley's mouth was dry. "Are you sure?"

"Yes." Aziraphale frowned. "I mean, no. I mean, I am as sure as one can be when dealing with 300 year old prophecies written by a brilliantly intelligent woman with a dastardly sense of humour."

Crowley went to push up his sunglasses, only to find he wasn't wearing any. He scrubbed his hand over his eyes instead.

"What about me?" He asked with a hollow voice. "I just get off lightly in all this, do I? Scot free, no strings attached, ride off into the sunset?"

Aziraphale hesitated, twisting his angel-wing ring.

"I'm… not quite so certain. '_ Ye _' is commonly used as a second person plural in the period Agnes was writing, but it can also be used as the formal singular… But Agnes isn't the most, um, _polite _of prophetesses, to put it mildly, so somehow I am inclined towards the former... In which case it would suggest she were speaking to both of us, rather than only to me…"

"Why not you and someone else?"

Aziraphale blinked, blankly.

"What?"

"Plural doesn't have to mean with me. I'm not the only person in the Universe."

"I- I… suppose. I hadn't considered, but I... " He shook his head. "No. No, don't be ridiculous, of course it's you, Crowley. Who else would it possibly be? We're a, a_ set _. If I'm not with you, I'm not with anyone, I'm the formal singular. There _is _no one else."

Crowley stared at the Angel and decided to just let it slide. There was already too much to deal with without unpacking _that _.

"Right, okay, fine. Whatever. She's talking to me too. Okay. What's gonna happen, then?"

"It's not as _easy _as that, Crowley…"

"It never bloody is."

"The nearest I can guess - and this is nothing but conjecture - is that Hell will… Similarly seek to punish you, I suppose. It's the _choose your faces wisely _bit that I think gives us our out, though. That's the key to-"

"Holy water!" Crowley interrupted with a shout. "Those _bastards _!"

"Well I'm not-"

"Holy water! That's what it'll be, won't it? Only makes sense. Hellfire for you, Holy Water for me! S'almost poetic. Balanced. ...Ngrrkkkk…"

Crowley choked on his words.

_Hellfire _. _Holy Water _.

"We're fucked," he said calmly.

"My dear, I don't think -"

"No. We are. We are absolutely _screwed _." Crowley ran his hands through his hair and started laughing. "This is never going to end, is it? It's just one thing after another. Eventually my luck is gonna run out, isn't it? _Then _it'll end. Then it'll end with a bang, or a whimper, or probably both, and that'll just be that. Done. Over. _Finito _." He turned his ire upwards. "Hey, You, up there, You listening to this? Is this some sort of a _joke _?! Is this _funny _to You?! Having a good old laugh up there, are You!? If You're even there…" He pressed a hand to his forehead. "Ugh, I can't cope with this sober."

Crowley turned and opened a cupboard. It suddenly had a lot more alcohol in it than when Aziraphale had looked.

"Crowley," Aziraphale put his hand on the Demon's arm. Crowley flinched as though it were red hot. "Look, just listen to me. I think I know what we need to do. I know how we can get out of this. Stop panicking."

"I'm not panicking!" Crowley panicked.

Then his thoughts finally caught up with him. _Choose your faces wisely _, that's what the prophecy had said. And _we need to possess each other _, that's what _Aziraphale _had said. Suddenly that seemed a lot less like a concussed proposition, and a lot more like...

"Oh no. No nononono no no."

Now he _was _panicking.

"It's the last thing they will expect!" Aziraphale said, cheerfully.

"Angel, I love you, but you are_ completely off your rocker _," he said, turning back to the shelf and pulling down a bottle of what looked like peach schnapps. He briefly struggled to unscrew the cap, then took a deep drink.

"Hellfire, Crowley. It would kill me, but do _nothing _to _you _. Stop working yourself up and _think _for a second."

Crowley winced.

Then he thought.

And then he nodded, slowly.

"Okay. Yeah. Hellfire. Not pleasant. Certainly not something I-" He grimaced at the thought of his angel being subjected to such a death and took another drink. "No. Yeah. No. Okay. Okay. Can't let that happen. And I've seen first hand what Holy Water does to Demons. But for you it'd just be, you know, like, a minor inconvenience. Like getting caught out without an umbrella." Crowley would much rather that Aziraphale were caught out without an umbrella than, than, than… It didn't bear thinking about. He'd do _anything _to protect him from that. Even this. "I... see your logic."

"Precisely. Look, Demons - and, evidently, Angels - can possess humans, correct? Well these bodies are, essentially, human. And Demons were, of course, once Angels. Same basic stock. _We _know that. _They _don't like to think about it. The possibility wouldn't even cross any of their minds. If they think they have captured me, when in fact they have captured _you _, then the punishment they mete out will fail momentously." The Angel squeezed Crowley's arm. "You'd be safe."

Ignoring the way his heart was thah-thumping at about three times its usual speed (because that was obviously just the _Archers _kicking in and nothing else. Definitely nothing related to the softness of certain Angel's eyes when they spoke, or the way a certain Angel always looked out for him and protected him and- Well, it wasn't anything like that, anyway), Crowley continued Aziraphale's line of thinking:

"And vice versa. Because if I'm up in Heaven, or wherever, getting a nice tan courtesy of our old _pal _Gabriel, then you, in my body- nnghhlkk-" Crowley swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. That's why he never drank schnapps, he remembered now. "-in my- _as me _, would be down there, just getting Holy Watered. Worst that'll happen is you might catch a cold. Instead of, instead of-" He flailed and took another swig from the bottle.

Only the most astute, undistracted, and un-peach-schnapps-glugging observers would have noticed the slight flinch and flicker of uncertainty which flashed across Aziraphale's face as Crowley spoke. As it was, Crowley missed it.

Aziraphale took a breath, and continued with enthusiasm. "We'll have them on the back foot, Crowley. What's that phrase you use? Game over, insert coin? If nothing else it would buy some _time. _I know it sounds implausible, but I'm certain that this is what Agnes was warning us of. _Choose your faces wisely _, Crowley. It's literal. It's _literal! _"

Aziraphale was far too excited about this. He was behaving just like he did whenever he managed to complete the _Times' _Cryptic Crossword. It was 1am, for Christ's sake.

It was 1am, and Crowley had a headache.


	21. Buck Up

oOo

**Buck Up**

At Crowley's insistence they had retired to the living room. Several bottles of the cheap schnapps had come with them. Crowley threw himself down on his sofa, shoes on the cushions, one arm folded behind his head, the other holding out a bottle out for Aziraphale. He was clearly planning on getting thoroughly drunk.

Aziraphale frowned, but didn't have it in him to criticise. It had been a long day, after all, and quite frankly he was relieved that Crowley was back to drinking questionable drinks and putting his shoes on the sofa, instead of pacing like a caged animal, ranting semi-coherently, and implying that he'd wanted to- Well. Aziraphale was grateful for small mercies, let's say that much.

He took the bottle and, shooting a resigned glance at Crowley who grinned back at him, downed a hearty slug of the stuff. This one was apple flavoured and it actually wasn't that bad, provided you ignored the similarities to industrial toilet cleaner.

"Right," Aziraphale said, pushing Crowley's feet out of the way so that he could sit down, "technically speaking, I don't think this should actually be too difficult. Just a case of aligning our miracles and ensuring that we both focus on the same action at the same time. It will take a little coordination, but it shouldn't be too complicated." He hesitated, bringing the bottle to his lips. "... I don't think."

"Angel, you're talking like this is some, like, like we're changing a tyre or something," Crowley berated. "This is _not _like changing a tyre."

"And how would you prefer I talk about it?" Aziraphale snapped, a little more irritatedly than he really should have. "Ought I to I steep my language in mystery and occultic _neologisms _, hm? Pepper my conversation with shots of erratic melodrama? Perhaps you would prefer if I summoned some atmospheric lightning bolts, try for a touch of fabricated pathetic fallacy? Would that better appeal to your _aesthetic sensibilities _as to how this conversation should go?"

"Alright, alright, no need to get like that… Starting to sound like _me _, angel." Crowley paused, taking another swig of the schnapps. " ...Ironically."

Then Crowley laughed, and Aziraphale didn't. He couldn't tell whether Crowley was failing to take this seriously, or was taking it so seriously he'd gone straight through the other side of serious and into a sort of slightly manic panic. He expected that it was the latter.

Holding his hands up in mocking, yet still placatory, defeat, the Demon sat up. Well, sat up _ish_, propping himself up on one elbow like some kind of ostentatious Roman aristocrat, only with more _angles_. Why he could never just sit normally Aziraphale had no idea. It couldn't be comfortable, surely?

"Fine. Aligning miracles. Easy peasy. Just like changing a tyre."

"I'm not saying that, and you know it," Aziraphale said with a sigh. "I just don't see why we can't be pragmatic about this."

"Yeah. Fine. _Pragmatic _. Absol_ute_ly. Let's just pragmatically _swap bodies _. Mm. Yeah. Piece of cake. ' _Pragmatic' _my arse..."

"As opposed to what, exactly?" Aziraphale knew he was being far too snappy with Crowley, but he couldn't help it. The Demon had been through an awful lot, but Aziraphale had been through rather a lot, too. And, as much as he tried to wear the mask, it was all beginning to take its toll. He was fractious because he was _afraid. _

Crowley groaned and threw his arms in the air, flopping dramatically onto the sofa cushions. He lay there, flat on his back, staring blankly at the ceiling, and offering no indication that he planned to do anything else in the near future.

Aziraphale shut his eyes. He was having enough difficulty persuading himself to keep calm and carry on, without having to persuade Crowley as well. He just wanted it all to be _over _. Except, of course, that he really, _really _didn't.

"_ Though this be madness, yet there is method in't _," the Demon recited out of nowhere. Ever the melodramatist.

"Hamlet," Aziraphale said, opening his eyes.

"Yeah. Still don't get the appeal of that one."

A flicker of a smile lit Aziraphale's face for just a moment. "If I remember correctly, you had a hand in making it as popular as it was."

"Yeah but only 'cause you wanted me to, angel. Didn't do it off the back of the play's personal merit. I hate _Hamlet _."

"It's good. It's_ tragic _."

"It's _sad _. Everyone _dies _."

"Yes. Well."

"I prefer the comedies," Crowley said, hauling himself back up to a seated position. "There's something to be said for comedies, you know. People overlook them. Not just Shakespeare's but in general, I reckon. They think funny is the opposite of serious*, but that's so reductive it borders on absurdity, and if you ask_ me _-"

Aziraphale listened in a slightly dazed way as Crowley went off on this well-worn tangent. He knew that he should interrupt him really, get them back on topic, but he couldn't muster up the resolve. He didn't _want _to stop him. He liked listening to Crowley's rants.

The Angel couldn't help but let his eyes drift over the Demon as he spoke. Arm thrown over the back of the sofa, legs tucked up beneath him, head tilted to one side, he looked ever so slightly vulnerable. Ever so slightly unguarded. Ever so slightly adorable. Aziraphale loved watching him in moments like this. When he was just talking, tripping along in that passionate, meandering, _snaking _way of his. He blended confidence and charm with fragility and curiosity in an impossible, irresistible, one might even go so far as to say _ineffable _way.

As much as he enjoyed the suave, swaggering, sardonic Crowley that the Demon displayed for the rest of the world, there was something so compelling about the Crowley that was allowed out when it was just the two of them. And it wasn't just that he relaxed, Crowley could relax around other people too, this was different. He was _warm. _Like the layer of ice he usually frosted over himself, slick, and hard, and cool, had melted. He moved, and spoke, and seemed like water, fluent and flowing and free. Especially without his sunglasses on. Aziraphale always appreciated it when Crowley didn't wear his glasses. He had such expressive, intelligent, soulful eyes. How could he help but gaze? Those eyes _glittered _, their depths almost unfathomable. The reflection of a sunrise on the ocean. The Angel sometimes felt as though he could drown in them.

Aziraphale snapped himself out of it. _No gazing _, he told himself. _Certainly no drowning. Not now _. _Now is not the time _. _Tread water, foolish Principality. _

Crowley was still talking, oblivious.

"- and that other one, with the two who were basically soulmates, but they fought all the time. Well not fought. Bickered. Sparred intellectually._ Much Ado About Nothing _, that's the one. That's got much more depth than _Hamlet _, if you really look. I like that one."

"You would," Aziraphale replied.

"Obviously. I just _said _that I _do _, angel. Get better insults. Dunno why that would be an insult, though. You love _Much Ado About Nothing _. I only bothered watching it because you wouldn't stop harping on about how good it was. Not that you were wrong."

Aziraphale nodded, dreamily. "It _is _a good play. Witty. Everyone gets their _happily ever after.. _."

Crowley sighed and drummed his fingers on the back of the sofa.

"So," he said, sounding as though the words were being dragged out of him with a fish hook, "we should probably…"

Aziraphale swallowed and nodded. He really was trying very hard to stay focused. To stay positive. To just _get on with it _without thinking too much. What happens, happens. _Que sera, sera _. There were no other options left, after all. None worth taking, anyway. This was his hand, all he could do was play it. And Crowley would be safe. That was the most important thing. That he was _at least _certain of. That meant he had to be brave. Even if, even if-

No. It wasn't worth thinking about. It wouldn't do anyone any good. And if Crowley got even the _slightest _inkling that the Angel had _any _doubts regarding his _own _safety in Hell...

Aziraphale shook himself_ . Buck up, old chap. _

"Right then," the Angel rejoined with some determination, "Yes. Quite. Absolutely." He blinked. "Um, as I was saying, I don't think the practicalities of it should be too complicated. I've recently had some experience in possession, courtesy of Madame Tracey, and I believe that, provided the host is willing - which I assume we both are?"

Crowley nodded.

"In which case, with mutually willing hosts, we shouldn't come up against any unexpected barriers. The most important thing is that we both remain receptive and don't accidentally kick the other out, or-."

"Won't happen," Crowley interrupted with such resolute certainty that it made Aziraphale feel lightheaded.

"Um, yes. Quite. Ah. Yes, well, all things considered, then, it really shouldn't be too difficult at all. But, of course, I've never actually done anything quite like _this _before… Not sure _anyone _has, to be honest…"

"First time for everything," Crowley said with a lilt and a smile.

"Uh, yes. Yes, I suppose that's true. Um. Anyway, uh. The thing is, I think it's the bit _after _that's going to be tricky…" Aziraphale frowned, drawing his eyebrows together and bringing his mouth into a pensive pout. "It's one thing to _look _like each other, but if we want to lend an air of verisimilitude to proceedings we'll have to _behave _like each other, too..."

"You mean, like, I'll have to pretend to love tartan, and you'll have to pretend to be really, really cool?"

"Somewhat oversimplified, but yes, basically."

Crowley shook his head dismissively. "It'll be fine, angel. We've known each other forever. If we can't act enough like each other to fool those idiots, then we are even more useless than we thought."

"That is my concern…"

"Don't worry about it. Seriously. We could go up to them dancing a _samba _and _juggling pineapples _and they wouldn't see anything amiss. They aren't like us, angel. They don't pay attention. And they think we're lost causes anyway. Probably chalk any inconsistencies up to yet more human contamination."

"Just don't do anything rash," Aziraphale said, anxiously. "Don't… don't hit anyone, or... And don't swear. Be reasonable. Be polite..." His nervous pout twisted into a mischievous little smirk in spite of himself. "No dancing, sambas or otherwise."

"Gavotte's off the table, then?" Crowley quipped back, quick as a whip.

Aziraphale did laugh, then, and shook his head despairingly.

"Crowley…"

"Yeah, yeah, I've got it, angel. Be good. Okay. Can do. And you, too, don't... I don't know. Don't ask Dagon for a mug of cocoa. Cocoa isn't very demonic. I don't drink cocoa."

"You do."

"W_ eeeee _ll yeah, but only when you make it. Dagon'd probably make it with _water _. And _definitely _wouldn't add a shot of Bailey's. _Or _those little marshmallow things," Crowley said with a grin, making the Angel laugh, yet again, in spite of himself. In spite of everything.

And suddenly Aziraphale realised what Crowley was trying to do. What he had, in many small ways, succeeded in doing. What he had always done. He wasn't being flippant for flippancy's sake. He wasn't even trying to lighten the mood for himself; Aziraphale could feel the nervous energy dripping off of him. No. It was all for the Angel. To make him _smile. _To put him at ease, and to break through that huffy, snappy, tightly-wound irritation with which Aziraphale was, evidently unsuccessfully, camouflaging his fear. So much for wearing the mask.

Crowley was trying, in his own idiosyncratic, dramatic, casually considerate way, to make the Angel feel _better _. He was clearly terrified himself, and yet here he was, chatting, and joking, and smiling, making jokes about marshmallows and quoting _Hamlet _...

It was too much.

Aziraphale did appreciate the sentiment, he really, truly did, but it was only making everything so much more _difficult _. All it was doing was reminding Aziraphale of how _kind _the Demon was. How thoughtful, and selfless, and _funny, _god, Crowley was so funny. Witty, and blithe, and wily, completely absurd in the best possible ways, and clever, oh so clever. And warm. Compassionate. Charismatic in his slightly unusual way. And so perfectly, deliciously adorable, in the _truest _sense of the word. There was just no one else like him. Not in the entire universe.

All that Crowley was doing was reminding the Angel of just how much he still had to lose.

**(Don't fight it. Use it.)**

Or, maybe, of just how much he still had to protect.

**(Take it. Let it make you strong.) **

Aziraphale smiled, pushing down the panic rising in his chest.

**(He'll be safe. That's all that matters.)**

"Right then," the Angel said, holding out his hand. "I suppose there's not much use in talking about it further. Shall we?"

"Oh, _let's _," Crowley said, taking a deep breath and Aziraphale's hand.

**_(This is mine. They can't have him.)_**

"Should we go on a count of three?"

**_(He is mine.)_**

"Hah. Yeah. Why not? Count of three."

**_(They will _****not** **_have him.)_**

"Right then."

"One."

"Two-"


	22. BRB

oOo

**BRB**

Aziraphale stopped.

He pulled back his hand.

He wasn't ready.

It wasn't that he'd changed his mind, or anything like that. It wasn't that with the moment upon him, fear had taken over and halted him in his tracks. No, it was nothing like that. It really wasn't. The Angel still had every intention of going through with this. This was the only thing they _could _do. It was the only way he could keep Crowley safe.

But he had realised, in that moment just before the three-count fell, that there was something he had to do first. Something he wanted to do as _himself_. If anything happened, if things didn't work out quite the way that they expected, the way that they hoped… He just had something he needed to do.

"Wait."

Crowley bobbed his head uncertainly.

"What?"

"I…" Aziraphale wrung his hands. This shouldn't be so hard. After all the things he had done, why was _this _so difficult?

"Angel? What's up?"

Aziraphale took a breath and steadied himself. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again locked them firmly on Crowley.

"I have something I have to say," he said in a carefully measured tone. "Something that I should have said a long time ago, really. Suppose I've been putting it off, what with one thing and another. But now I don't think I really can put it off any longer. Might not be able to. In case -"

"Nah nahnahno no no no no no. None of that, angel." Crowley interjected, shaking his head and refusing to meet Aziraphale's eye. "S'no '_ in case _'. In case nothing. Everything'll be fine. We've got it planned out. Don't go nn-mm-ngn all - you know - don't get all, you know - just…" He looked at Aziraphale with pleading eyes. "Don't."

"Crowley, please, I -"

"No! Tell me after. Whatever it is, you can tell me after. I promise. When we've dealt with all of _them_, and everything's all, you know… ngk… _After. _'Kay? Right. Good."

"No, it is not okay, Crowley!" Aziraphale snapped, more harshly than he had intended.

The Demon flinched.

"I'm sorry, Crowley."

"Ngk. Don't be sorry. It's fine. Just don't _do _it. Just wait until we've sorted all of _this_, and then after, then we can talk about whatever -"

"No, I'm _sorry _. That's… That's what I needed to say. I'm sorry."

Crowley's eyebrows drew together and he shook his head.

"Why? For what?"

"For -" Aziraphale stared at his hands palm up in his lap, as though he could read an easier answer in them. He sighed. Now or never. Maybe. "For… for being such a _fool _. For not treating as you deserve to be treated. For not…"

Crowley began to wave away Aziraphale's concerns but the Angel would have none of it.

"I have been a terrible friend, Crowley."

"Angel, you are being ridiculous -"

"I've lied to you, and not trusted you, and I've said such awful, horrible things to you, and -"

"What? Like what?"

Aziraphale blanched. "I… I told you that we weren't friends. That I didn't like you. That the- that the very idea of us…running away together… was ridiculous."

Crowley's mouth formed a hard line. He was silent for a few moments.

"But you were right. About…" He grimaced. "...About running away together. Terrible idea. Disaster of an idea. You were right."

"I wasn't right, Crowley. Or, well, it was right not to run away, ultimately. But the, the, the _idea _of it - I… I implied that the very concept was- wasn't- I implied that I didn't _want _to."

Crowley made a strangled noise in the back of his throat.

"I handled it all terribly. Everything. Even before all of _this _. I thought I was protecting you, but all I was doing was, was-" Aziraphale shook his head, sadly. "So much could have been avoided, had I just- had I been more-"

"But it all worked out in the end, didn't it? Sort of? No harm, no foul, and all that?" Crowley wasn't doing a very good job of sounding nonchalant, although he was trying very hard.

"Crowley, you know that's not even _remotely _close to being anywhere _near _true. And even if it were, that's not the point. The reason I behaved so… I didn't do the things I did because I knew that they would…" The Angel sighed. "I should have trusted you."

"Ah, nah… Nngnmmngn… Nah. No. Probably not a good idea, trusting me. Don't want to go around trusssting demons. I don't- it's not- I _get _it. Don't worry about it. Bessst decision really, not trusting me. I'm-"

"But I do trust you, Crowley. Implicitly."

The Demon huffed; a sound that could have been a restrained laugh, but could equally have been a restrained sob.

"I've trusted you for a long time," Aziraphale continued. "Or, rather, I've known that I _could _trust you. I just didn't let myself. Didn't want to, I suppose. Didn't want to admit that I trusted a Demon far more than any _Angel _I'd met. More than anyone, in fact. I think, perhaps, that that frightened me. Not only because of what Demons are supposed to be, but I- I suppose I couldn't trust myself to trust you. Not because of _you _, but- If I let myself trust you, then… Well. Safer just to not."

Crowley remained silent.

"Bit beyond _safe _now though, so that's rather a redundant concern." Aziraphale smiled very, very sadly. "I am sorry for that, Crowley. For all of it. I'm sorry that we're in this… this _mess _. You deserve _better _. Don't shake your head at me, you _do _. I know you don't like me saying it, and I do tease you terribly at times, but please know that I _mean it _when I say this, Crowley: You are a _genuinely good person _. Not _angelically _good. You are so much _better _than that. ...No doubt that is an incredibly blasphemous thing to believe. Gabriel can add that to my list of sins."

Chasing away the habituated clouds of worry and doubt, a flash of anger lit up Aziraphale's face like the first lightning bolts over Eden.

"And damn him for it. Damn the lot of them!_ I _think it's blasphemous to deny goodness just because you have found it somewhere that someone else has decided it ought not to be! I don't care if you are a Demon, Crowley. You are the nicest, dearest, cleverest, _best _person I know. You are a _Good Demon _. ...The precise theological and eschatological ramifications of that are persisting in eluding me, but I've come to the point where frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn. You have been a good friend to me, Crowley. The best, in fact. Far, far better than I deserve. And, no matter what happens next, I have been, and shall always be _yours _."

The Angel took a breath. He'd gotten a little more impassioned there than he had planned. But he meant it, he meant every word. It felt so freeing to finally get that off of his chest, Heaven be damned.

"That's all I wanted to say," Aziraphale finished. "That I'm sorry." He fiddled with the winged ring on his little finger. "And that, I suppose, when it comes down to it, you see, the thing is, Crowley, you really ought to know that I really rather love-"

Crowley, who had up until this moment been completely silent to the point of forgetting to _breathe_, cut the Angel off with a hiss.

"Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssstttppptttt! Yup! Right. Mmnnmn'kay. Ngk. Um."

Clearing his throat, Crowley tried to drop the pitch of his voice back down to its usual octave.

"I, uh, uh, uh… nngnkgn… I jusssssssssssssssst have to…" Crowley swallowed, eyes wide, shaking his head rapidly. "I think I left the oven on. BRB."

With that, the Good Demon leapt to his feet and bolted from the room, nearly tripping over the coffee table in his haste. From somewhere in the hall, Aziraphale heard a door slam.

The Angel put his hands primly on his knees.

"That went well," he muttered to himself.

Then he frowned.

"...What's _bee are bee _?"


	23. Unforgivable

oOo

**Unforgivable**

The bathroom door slammed. Crowley hadn't meant to shut it so hard, but he had temporarily lost the use of his fine motor skills. Gross motor skills? Whatever, Crowley had lost the use of _all _of his motor skills at this point. He was lucky the door was still on its hinges, the way he'd kicked it open and wrenched it shut behind him. _The Angel probably heard that _, he thought. Or he would have thought, were his head not in the midst of a maelstrom of emotion. He could barely _see _straight, let alone _think _.

Crowley braced himself on the edges of the sink, gripping until his knuckles turned white. _Ridiculous, ridiculouss, ridiculousss, ridiculoussssss. _Even in his thoughts he was hissing his esses, now. He hated it. He _hated _it. He bit down on his tongue and only stopped when he tasted blood.

The Demon was adrift.

Crowley looked up into the excessively large mirror that hung over his sink. He really was a wreck. His face was still ash-blackened and soot-stained from the bookshop and the car, and his hair was sticking up all over the place and slick with sweat and dirt. His shirt was filthy, and somehow, he had no idea how, his waistcoat buttons were done up all wrong.

His skin was pale, the heavy circles around his eyes were purple and black, and he looked as though he'd aged more in the past twenty-four hours than he had in the last six thousand years, which all things considered, he probably had. And he'd been walking around like this all night! What on earth must people have thought of him? No wonder those people in the pub had looked at him weird. He'd thought it had been because of the sword. And Aziraphale had been looking at him like this all evening. He could have said something!

Staring at himself in the mirror, Crowley began to laugh. He laughed until his chest hurt. He laughed until his head ached. He laughed until his laughter buckled and cracked into unrelenting sobs.

Or, not quite sobs. Crowley wasn't sobbing. Crowley never sobbed.

He swallowed hard and looked back up into the mirror, staring deep into his own eyes. His own yellow, serpentine, unangelic, _inhuman _eyes. His _dry _eyes. God, how he hated them.

Crowley never cried. Tears never spilled over his eyelashes, or dripped, ugly, onto his sunken cheeks. They never left stains on his skin or expensive silk shirts. His eyes were never one good blink away from tears falling at inconvenient and awkward moments. They never did, they never were, they never had, they never would. No matter how much he wanted them to.

And it wasn't because of any misplaced machismo, or fear of looking weak, Crowley wasn't that kind of a person. And it wasn't because crying was uncool and he _was _cool, nor because he was some haughty, icy, unfeeling Demon. Not even because he was _any _kind of a Demon, in fact, because he knew that _other _Demons cried.

He'd seen Hastur cry tears of joy after seeing a baby fall out of a pram when its mother was on the phone and wasn't paying attention. And he'd seen Beelzebub cry with sadness and frustration after they'd tripped and dropped their ice cream and Dagon said they didn't have time to go and get another because they had a meeting, and Beelzebub had just imposed really strict rules against being late and it would undermine_ everything _if they were late, _especially _if they were late and showed up with an _ice cream _...

Other Demons cried. But not him. Never him. Snakes_ don't _cry.

Crowley had read about tears. About how psychic tears, the ones that are caused by extremes of emotion, actually contain chemicals, or proteins, or whatever - things with names Crowley couldn't pronounce, that _reduce stress _. That reduce _pain _. That tears actually get _rid _of some of those irritating, enervating, _paralysing _feelings that, that, that, that _exist _even when you try really, really hard to force them not to. Crying released some of those hormones, it physically got them out of the body. Crying really did make things _better. _

His throat constricted and the Demon folded over on himself, kept upright only thanks to his continued grip on the counter. His shoulders shuddered and convulsed as he was forced through the crying equivalent of dry-heaving. He could barely breathe. It _hurt _.

Of all the punishments She had inflicted upon him, he felt that this was one of Her cruellest.

Crowley slammed his fist into the wall hard, catching the corner, knuckles gouging into the sharp edges of his onyx black tiles.

He regretted the decision immediately.

"Ah! Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow _owwwwww _!" He brought his knuckles to his mouth. "Mother _fucker _! _Ouch.. _."

Whimpering, Crowley turned on the tap and let the cold water run over his hand. He splashed some on his face for good measure. It made him feel a little better. Not much. But it was something. It was something to do.

He pulled a towel off of the wall rack and slid to the floor by the locked door. He sat with his back pressed up against the wall and he hugged his knees tight to his chest. He made himself small. He wished he could make himself _disappear. _

_You are a genuinely good person. Not _angelically _good. You are so much _better _than that. _

Crowley squeezed his eyes shut.

_I'm a Demon_, he said to himself. Said to the absent Aziraphale. Said to the Universe at large. _I'm Fallen. I'm flawed. I'm _wrong_._ _I'm not good, I'm not nice,_ _I'm, I'm, I'm… _" He gritted his teeth. "_I'm _Anthony J. Crowley,_ and I am _not good enough_. Not good enough for Heaven, not good enough for God, not good enough for anything. So damn them all. I'll never be good enough, and I'll never try to be. And I don't want to be! I'll never judge myself by their standards. Never- ...Never bend to their will. I'll never be what they want me to be. Never._

_Never again. _

Crowley's breath hitched.

Because he_ had _been angelically good, once. He'd painted the heavens. He'd created the stars. He'd walked by Her side and pointed out every nebula, every cluster, every supernova that he'd made, and She'd smiled. He'd been so proud. He'd been so Loved. He'd been the best of them all, once.

But then it went wrong.

He'd asked too many questions. He'd been too interested. He wanted to know _everything _. He wanted to poke into every corner of existence and take it apart to see how it worked. He'd just wanted to _understand _.

And so he'd asked. He'd asked, and he'd asked, and he'd asked, and he never got any answers. Before long, the Heavenly Hosts began to see his questions as impertinence and his inquisitiveness as interference. He was marked as meddlesome and quarrelsome and irksome, and he was labelled A Trouble Maker. And all the while he grew ever more disillusioned, and ever more distanced. When faced with their condescension, Crowley met it with subtle sarcasm. He met their impatience with unshakeable obstinance. He met their lazy dogmatism and their self-righteous apathy and their _arrogance _with silent and seething _rebellion _.

He hadn't started out that way. He had been One Of Them, once. They'd been his mentors. His colleagues. His _family _. But the more he found his curiosity shot down with hostility, the less he was able to close his eyes to their _hypocrisies _. The less he could tolerate, and the less he could _respect _. He became what they believed him to be. They were going to think it anyway. Why bother trying to prove them wrong?

_Do you see now, angel? This is what I am. _

Lucifer had asked questions too. He asked questions like:

"Aren't omnipotence and omniscience mutually exclusive?_ " _

And

"Is knowledge ever bad? Can you_ have _too much knowledge? _" _

And

"What created God?_ " _

And then, as the Lightbringer gained more listeners among the disaffected ranks, the questions changed. They took on a sharper edge. They grew angry, and they grew loud.

"Look how She places the humans over us. Look at the love She gives them. Why are they so much more deserving than us? Why are they so much more important than us?_ " _

and

"Are _we _not intelligent? Are _we _not beautiful? Are we not _powerful _? _" _

and then

"Who decided that She should be in charge, anyway? Why is _She _so much better than _Us _? Why should _we _bend _our _knees? Why are we not _Gods?" _

They'd stopped being questions, by then. The words had become a rallying cry. Those loyal to Lucifer wanted power and change, and those loyal to God wanted power and stability. No one wanted answers. No one cared about the truth. They shouted and they railed, and their opposition shouted back. No one listened, and no one learned, and no one looked at themselves and asked why they were doing this, or whether they could be wrong. No one asked any questions, anymore.

And God stopped answering.

_I'm sorry _. _I'm sorry... I didn't mean for it to happen. I didn't want to Fall. I never turned my back on You. _You _turned _Your _back on _me _. I loved You so much, but you abandoned me. You stopped talking. You stopped helping. What was I supposed to do? Where was I supposed to turn? You let go of my hand in the dark, and I Fell. I Fell and You weren't there to catch me. _

The War came. It swept over them all. There could be no neutrality, no third option, no alternative. You were With Us or Against Us. You were Our Ally or Our Enemy. You Assented, or you Rebelled.

Crowley never liked being told what to do.

And so he fought. He fought, and they lost, and he Fell. Fell from Heaven, Fell from Grace, Fell from one tyranny to another. Worst of all, he Fell from Her favour. He Fell from Her love.

And in doing so, Crowley learned that love was conditional. Love was impermanent. Love lasts as long as you are perfect, and it doesn't forgive imperfection. Love doesn't _forgive _at all. It should. But it didn't. Not in the real world. Not for him.

_I forgive you, Aziraphale had said. _

_You don't, _Crowley thought. _You can't. And you shouldn't. _

_I am unforgivable. _

"Crowley? Are you... alright?"


	24. love With A Little L

oOo

**love With A Little L**

There was a tentative knock on the door.

Crowley sniffed miserably. "What?"

Another cautious knock.

With a noise between a whimper, a growl, and a sigh, Crowley stretched across the doorway and flicked the lock. It clicked open.

Silence.

And then yet another quiet knock.

"Oh, for God's sake…" Crowley leaned over and pulled down on the door handle, gave it a gentle push and allowed the door to swing open into the hallway.

"Hey, angel," he said with an air of breezy existential exhaustion and chipper nihilistic despair as he turned back to staring blankly at the wall. "What'sss up?"

Crowley didn't need to look up to know that the Angel would be standing off to one side of the doorway, neither in nor out, wringing his hands and wearing a worried expression on his careworn face. He didn't need to look up to know that he would be running an anxious eye over Crowley's crumpled and hunched form, folded up and wrapped around itself on the cold, black floor tiles. He didn't need to look up to feel the Angel's concern when he saw his bruised and lacerated knuckles or the small smear of blood on his lip from his bitten tongue. He didn't need to look up, and so he didn't.

Aziraphale said nothing. He just slid down and joined the Demon on the floor. He sat in the hallway with his back against the wall, posture mimicking Crowley's. An untwisted mirror image of himself. An Angel sitting across a doorway from a Demon. Across the gap.

"Hi," Crowley drawled, as though he were sitting at some bar somewhere instead of huddled up on his bathroom floor. As though this were nothing outside of the usual.

"Hi," Aziraphale said back.

Back to the silence. Crowley could feel Aziraphale's eyes on him. He didn't look up.

"Your hand," the Angel finally said.

"Yeah."

Crowley hoped Aziraphale wouldn't ask about it. About anything. He just hoped he'd… Well, he didn't really know what he hoped for. He didn't want the Angel to leave, he knew that much. But he didn't want to talk about it, either. Crowley didn't know what he wanted, anymore.

"... May I?"

Crowley rolled his head to the side and stared at Aziraphale. The Angel was wearing an expression of earnest but anxious concern. That was Aziraphale up and down the line, really, wasn't it? Earnest, anxious, concerned.

_Why are you here? _Crowley didn't ask. _Why are you _still _here? Is it just because you have nowhere else to go? Is it because you feel duty-bound? Is it because you _pity _me? _

_You know it isn't. _Aziraphale didn't reply.

_ Yeah. Well. You can know something and still not believe it. _

_Yes. I know. _

Taking a breath, Crowley shifted and held out his bloodied hand to the Angel. When Aziraphale looked back at him with his eyes wide, Crowley inclined his head an infinitesimal degree, a tiny gesture of assent. _Go ahead _, he said and didn't say.

And so, cautiously, as though approaching a scared and wild animal, Aziraphale reached across the open doorway. Gently he wrapped his fingers around Crowley's wrist, holding it up and pulling him closer.

Crowley became painfully aware of just how fast his pulse was beating, racing nineteen-to-the-dozen beneath the Angel's fingertips. He hoped that Aziraphale wouldn't notice, but expected that he probably would. Oh well.

Aziraphale placed his other hand over the top of Crowley's lacerated knuckles, and the Demon winced in anticipation of pain that never arrived. Aziraphale ran his fingers so lightly across the back of Crowley's hand that he could barely feel it. All he felt was a strange, tingling, feathery sensation, like spiders scuttling beneath his skin. And then it stopped.

Aziraphale slowly lifted his hand. The angry cuts and the threatening bruises were gone. Crowley flexed his fingers. The Angel had healed him.

"Thanksss," he hissed.

"Oh, don't mention it," Aziraphale replied, "no trouble at all. Just glad I could help…" He was still holding Crowley's hand, supporting it underneath with his palm, fingers wrapping around his bony, delicate wrist, thumb stroking the back of his hand.

When Aziraphale let go, Crowley just let his hand fall to the floor. A dead weight. He didn't have the energy. He stared at it for a few seconds in silence before dragging his gaze up to meet the Angel's.

"You're wrong, you know," Crowley said.

Aziraphale smiled weakly. "In general? I don't doubt it."

"I'm sssserious, angel. You -" Crowley frowned and turned away, unable to continue looking him in the eye. "You didn't... have to apologissse. Before."

"Crowley -"

"No, just _lisssssssten _. None of that, none of what you said… You didn't do all of that ssssstuff out of selfishness, or malice, or cowardice, or... It wasn't out of… I know that you were protecting _me _as much as yourssself. More than yourself. Sometimes I forget that, that, that- That you, nnmmgggkkk, _care _."

He glared at Aziraphale defensively, as if challenging him to argue the point. Challenging him to say that he was wrong. That he didn't care, hadn't cared, would and could _never _care. But the Angel just watched him, silently.

"You just- you- I- you- I _understand _. I mean- Like with the Holy Water. You didn't- you weren't- At the time I thought you were just being, you know, petty, or obstinate, or, or, ngkmmk, like, you just… Like it was too much _hassssle _for you. That _I _was too much hassle for you. But that wasn't your fault, that was- it was- you were only trying to _protect _me. And not just with that, with, with, with, with all of it. The _Arrangement _. All of it. It- I- It-..."

Crowley shook his head.

"It's dangerous, I get it, it's… I get it. We've taken a lot of risks, you and I. And I might have taken more, if you'd let me, and who knows what might have happened then. We were on thin enough ice as it was. And all the times you- I didn't always see it at the time, but- ...I thought you were- ...but you weren't, it was- ...You were always trying to keep me _safe _, angel. I get that, now. And you shouldn't apologise for that. Shouldn't apologise for... Because that _matters _\- It- I- I _get it. _I…"

Crowley trailed off with a groan, dragging his hands down his face. "I am no good at this."

"Oh, I don't know," Aziraphale said, gently.

Leaning his head back against the wall, and letting his arms fall to his sides, Crowley stared at the ceiling and sighed.

"It was worth it, angel. The risk. All of it. _You _were worth it. Don't be sorry. 'Cause I'm not sorry. I'm not sorry."

Aziraphale's breath caught audibly in his throat; a small noise which sounded distressingly like tears being restrained.

"Look at us," the Angel said with a broken laugh. "We make a right old pair, don't we."

Crowley tilted his head to one side. _Yes _, he thought. _Yes we do _.

"Angel," Crowley said, softly.

"Mm?"

"You said, before…" Crowley trailed off. He wanted to ask, but he wasn't sure he knew how to.

"Yes?"

"You said... you said that you _forgave _me…" Crowley spoke very, very quietly.

"Ah."

"Do you?" He pressed, though he knew he should know better. "Forgive me?"

Crowley felt Aziraphale's eyes searching his face, and watched as a flood of thoughts flitted across the Angel's features. Crowley could read them all.

_There's nothing to forgive _, said the set of his jaw.

_I would take everything that's ever hurt you and suffer it in your place, if only I could. If only I could, _said the inward pull of his eyebrows.

_I can't even begin to tell you how much I love you, every last bit of you, all that you are _, the tugging at the edges of his mouth said, betraying him.

And _I'm sorry, _his eyes lamented, soft and sad and bright with pain. _I'm sorry that you even feel the need to ask. It should be me begging for forgiveness. It is. I am. _

"Yes," Aziraphale said.

"Oh."

The Demon dropped his gaze to his lap.

Aziraphale took a breath.

"Could you ever forgive_ me _?"

That caught Crowley off guard. It shouldn't have. He should have seen it coming. It was obviously coming. The rules of the narrative universe demanded that it came. And he would have expected it, had he not been so tired. But if he hadn't been so tired, he wouldn't have brought it up in the first place. He wouldn't have said anything. He would have known better. _Would _that have been better?

Crowley's initial reaction was to reply "_ no _". He wanted to say that there was nothing for him to forgive. He wanted to say that perfection doesn't need forgiveness, that the flawed could never forgive the flawless. That was Crowley's gut reaction. That was his heart's reaction. That was the reaction that had been hammered into him.

It was the _wrong _reaction.

Because to say that, to say 'no', to say any of those things, would be to do the Angel a severe disservice. Aziraphale was_ better _than that.

Crowley looked back across at the Angel, and really _looked _at him.

That's what they'd always demanded of him, wasn't it? Heaven. Perfection. They'd held him up against impossible, unreachable, _unwantable _standards. They'd wanted him to be like Gabriel, like Michael, like _Sandalphon _. Anodyne and obedient and unimaginative and _heartless _. _Cruel _. To never make mistakes, to never want anything they thought he shouldn't want, or do anything they thought he shouldn't do. To never deviate from the party lines. To be the version of Aziraphale that they had written for him. For all of his existence the Angel had been told that they would all love him just the way he was, as long as he was _perfect _.

Aziraphale wasn't perfect. Not _their _version of perfect. He was hedonistic, and curious, and he had a wicked sense of humour. He was compassionate, and anxious, and so full of questions, even if he was too afraid to always ask them. He was petty, and he was ridiculous, and he was more than a bit of a bastard at heart. He was unabashedly _Aziraphale _, and he was overbrimming with an unrestrained _love _for _life _.

Angels weren't supposed to love. They were supposed to _Love _, in that cold, distant, abstract way with a capital L and a ™ at the end. Aziraphale loved with a little L. He loved personally, and selfishly, and possessively, and complicatedly. He loved _things _. He loved _ideas _. He loved _people _. And he loved the world. That was a big one, that. Big mistake, in the eyes of Heaven. The world wasn't a thing to be loved, it was an exercise in design, a cog in the Great Plan, a stage for war. They'd all helped to build this fantastic, beautiful, interesting, _messy _universe, only to be condemned for becoming invested in it. Condemned for caring. And Aziraphale was _so _invested in it. Aziraphale cared _so much _.

Where Crowley had rebelled against all of that, against those unfair expectations, that imbalance of power, all of the blatant hypocrisies, the Angel had turned his cheek. Where Crowley embraced those things _they _said were flaws, suffered them and flaunted them, the Angel had taken them to heart. He had locked them up and buried them at his very core, and they bled, poisonous, into every part of him.

Because he _believed _them. He believed that he was capable of being what they wanted him to be, that he _ought _to be what they wanted him to be, and that his 'failings' were exactly that - his, and his alone. Instead of questioning Heaven, he questioned himself. Instead of blaming them, he blamed himself. Instead of fighting them, he fought _himself _. He took on all of their criticisms, all of their passive aggression, all of their toxicity and cruelty and manipulation, and he used it to try to _make himself better _.

Only, he was better from the start. Better than the things they wanted him to be. Better than the person he strived to be, misguidedly. He was better than _them _. But the Angel couldn't see that. He had never seen that. He _still couldn't see that _. He still saw his greatest strengths as his most unforgivable weaknesses. Beneath his kindness, beneath his vivacity, beneath his intelligence, and empathy, and courage, Aziraphale was _wounded. _

Crowley found it hard to remember that, sometimes, when the Angel was being particularly obstinate, particularly holier-than-thou, particularly naive and wilfully so. It was hard to remember that those things didn't come from a position of superiority. Quite the opposite. It was insecurity. Instability. Uncertainty. The feeling that he was standing on shifting sands, and that no matter which way he turned, it would be the wrong way. The feeling that he was always standing on the edge of losing faith. Losing hope. Losing the only foundations that he knew. The feeling that he wanted to _jump _...

_But never mind all that. Keep calm and carry on. You can get through it, if you just try a little harder. If you just work a little smarter. If you just _be _a little _better _. Come on, Aziraphale, buck up! _

It was infuriating. It was devastating. It wasn't _fair _.

So, yeah. Aziraphale was far from 'perfect'. He was flawed, and fallible, and in spite of everything, in spite of _them _, he was still so _kind. _

Perhaps forgiving someone didn't have to be the same as saying that they had done something wrong_ . _Not necessarily. Perhaps forgiveness could be less about tolerating imperfections, and more about embracing them. Maybe it could be saying _I accept you, for all that you are _. A sort of unconditional absolution, for all the things you could never forgive of yourself. Perhaps, after all, forgiveness was just one more way of saying _for all of your mistakes, for all of your flaws, you are my version of perfect. Because of them, you are my version of perfect. _

Was that what Aziraphale had meant, too?

Perhaps.

"Yeah," Crowley said. "I forgive you, too."

In that moment, Crowley's tiredness suddenly overtook him. It felt as though the few remaining bolsters of nervous energy that had been propping him up had faltered. The last remaining barricades had broken. He had been exhausted since… Well, he actually couldn't really remember a time he _hadn't _felt exhausted. He was so tired he couldn't imagine what it was like to _not _be tired.

He blinked.

"'M' just gonna lie down for a sec'..." he said, slurring the words. He laid down on his side on

the cold bathroom tiles, curling his knees in towards his chest. He pulled the soft, plushy, grey towel from his lap and balled it up beneath his head. "Jussssst for a sec'."

He sensed Aziraphale move, and his eyes flickered back open. He hadn't realised that they had closed.

"Don't go," he said without meaning to.

He heard a smile in Aziraphale's voice. "I'm not going anywhere."

Crowley opened his eyes again to find Aziraphale's face ten or so inches from his own. Crowley glanced up and realised that the Angel was now laying on the floor too, curled up opposite him. Head in the doorway, feet in the hall. A mirror image. A puzzle piece.

"Gap's gone," Crowley murmured.

"What?"

"S'nothin'," Crowley replied. "Just a thing."

He reached out his hand across the doorway, and Aziraphale took it.


End file.
